1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,300 Cliff: Today we're talking about We Are the Romans by Botch. 2 00:00:03,884 --> 00:00:09,614 So, Kyle, I know that many of our illustrious fans have messaged us 3 00:00:09,614 --> 00:00:14,694 directly and said, thank you so much for expanding my palette with things 4 00:00:14,704 --> 00:00:20,952 such as Alain Goresje and Ravi Shankar, but this time, would you mind doing 5 00:00:20,952 --> 00:00:22,752 something that's more accessible? 6 00:00:23,092 --> 00:00:25,592 to normal people to immediately pick up. 7 00:00:26,182 --> 00:00:29,372 And the answer to that is a resounding, um, no, sorry. 8 00:00:29,672 --> 00:00:31,679 No, no, not this time. 9 00:00:32,019 --> 00:00:35,849 Unfortunately, it's still important and, uh, we need to pull your 10 00:00:35,849 --> 00:00:38,579 palate in another direction for fun. 11 00:00:38,809 --> 00:00:42,369 Although for spoilers that it will be significantly different 12 00:00:42,719 --> 00:00:46,059 than the previous two vibes that we've asked you to get down with. 13 00:00:46,879 --> 00:00:49,939 Kyle: Imagine if we'd gone from Marvin Gaye into this one. 14 00:00:50,174 --> 00:00:52,134 Cliff: There are threads that we could pull there too. 15 00:00:52,134 --> 00:00:52,824 So why not? 16 00:00:52,898 --> 00:00:57,038 the whole thing of this podcast is look at how all these things interconnect. 17 00:00:57,598 --> 00:01:02,958 This record is really, really important to us, to a lot of people. 18 00:01:03,318 --> 00:01:07,525 And in the moment that we're recording this session together, 19 00:01:07,525 --> 00:01:11,435 which is a little bit before it will be released in the appropriate 20 00:01:11,485 --> 00:01:13,115 month relative to the calendar. 21 00:01:13,305 --> 00:01:19,045 But in this particular moment, Botch is about to finish its, well, what 22 00:01:19,045 --> 00:01:22,772 it says is its final, final show. 23 00:01:23,302 --> 00:01:29,052 Although as we'll discuss, I'm sure this is a band that would agitate promoters 24 00:01:29,052 --> 00:01:32,592 by consistently saying that they were about to play their last show ever 25 00:01:32,872 --> 00:01:34,652 for years and years and years on end. 26 00:01:34,992 --> 00:01:37,962 Um, and so even in this moment, it's going to be a little difficult to 27 00:01:37,962 --> 00:01:40,732 try to figure out whether that's actually what's happening or not, 28 00:01:41,099 --> 00:01:41,869 Kyle: I kind of believe 29 00:01:41,999 --> 00:01:42,619 Cliff: I do too. 30 00:01:42,809 --> 00:01:43,249 Kyle: Yeah. 31 00:01:43,859 --> 00:01:45,469 So like, thanks for all the wind up. 32 00:01:45,479 --> 00:01:51,179 But also they'll, if time is any indicator, they'll be in their 60s the 33 00:01:51,179 --> 00:01:53,159 next time they choose to resurrect. 34 00:01:53,159 --> 00:01:54,569 Um, I just. 35 00:01:55,244 --> 00:01:55,804 I don't know. 36 00:01:55,854 --> 00:01:57,714 Anybody can do anything at any age. 37 00:01:57,984 --> 00:01:59,334 Just look at Iggy Pop, but 38 00:02:00,384 --> 00:02:00,764 Cliff: Yup. 39 00:02:00,834 --> 00:02:02,074 Kyle: I don't, know that they'll want to. 40 00:02:02,414 --> 00:02:06,354 Cliff: No, they seem to enjoy Charlie Browning the football away from 41 00:02:06,354 --> 00:02:07,914 people every time they go to kick it. 42 00:02:08,384 --> 00:02:13,004 So I would imagine that this moment is probably probably, if I had to bet, 43 00:02:13,054 --> 00:02:17,414 sincere for the purposes of being like, did you ever expect us to be sincere 44 00:02:17,414 --> 00:02:19,054 here at the last moment of our career? 45 00:02:19,374 --> 00:02:19,744 Kyle: yeah. 46 00:02:19,744 --> 00:02:26,494 And the other thing that's different this time is they are sincerely, undeniably, 47 00:02:27,189 --> 00:02:33,859 kicking everyone's ass like the people who knew knew back in the day and then 48 00:02:33,889 --> 00:02:37,509 other people had 20 years to catch up and they've been at the full height of their 49 00:02:37,509 --> 00:02:44,269 powers for the what 14 plus months they've been torn on this record since the whole 50 00:02:44,269 --> 00:02:49,819 thing sort of started on a whim it's a whole fun story but here we are the thing 51 00:02:49,819 --> 00:02:55,421 for me Going into this one was it's like the water right in front of our face. 52 00:02:55,511 --> 00:02:58,131 The, this is, we've talked about converge. 53 00:02:58,131 --> 00:03:01,881 We've talked about me without you, but I would say if there's like a Rosetta 54 00:03:01,881 --> 00:03:07,721 stone record, the whole reason we started music grid before Tundig was because of 55 00:03:07,721 --> 00:03:12,441 a little band called the chariot that absolutely wouldn't exist without Botch. 56 00:03:12,861 --> 00:03:17,131 And I would say the majority of the like center of the Venn 57 00:03:17,141 --> 00:03:19,901 diagram of our musical friendship. 58 00:03:20,476 --> 00:03:24,216 owes everything to Botch and to this record specifically. 59 00:03:24,216 --> 00:03:31,373 So it's a bit like, any anyone who already probably needs to know knows and then 60 00:03:31,373 --> 00:03:36,443 everyone else, why would you even bother going about Convincing them, you know, 61 00:03:36,453 --> 00:03:38,433 how do you jump from Ravi Shankar to this? 62 00:03:38,943 --> 00:03:42,783 Where it's like it's so intensely personal and it's so about seeing the niche and 63 00:03:42,783 --> 00:03:48,233 whatever but I think there's some really good universal stuff to unpack here that 64 00:03:48,763 --> 00:03:55,003 I hope we avoid trafficking in the cliches that so many people have done in talking 65 00:03:55,003 --> 00:04:01,020 about This band and this record and what it ostensibly means But I do think there 66 00:04:01,020 --> 00:04:04,777 is a fair amount of stuff to take away once you take the cannonball to the gut 67 00:04:04,907 --> 00:04:07,297 of the opening sounds of this record. 68 00:04:07,664 --> 00:04:08,004 Cliff: Yup. 69 00:04:08,371 --> 00:04:13,048 To that end, the Bandcamp summary from the reissue of this record. 70 00:04:13,413 --> 00:04:17,143 It's good enough to just say as an intro to talking about this 71 00:04:17,143 --> 00:04:18,583 thing, cause it's hilarious. 72 00:04:19,133 --> 00:04:19,913 Begin quote. 73 00:04:20,280 --> 00:04:23,220 Unless you've been living under a rock that's underneath an even bigger rock 74 00:04:23,220 --> 00:04:25,990 in a cave in the middle of nowhere, you probably already know what's 75 00:04:25,990 --> 00:04:27,830 up with this milestone of an album. 76 00:04:28,260 --> 00:04:34,550 Initially released in the year two grand, Baja's final full length was slash is 77 00:04:34,840 --> 00:04:39,910 the kind of devastating metallic hardcore explosion that the term quote metallic 78 00:04:39,910 --> 00:04:43,380 hardcore could slash can only aspire to. 79 00:04:43,660 --> 00:04:47,160 In fact, these dudes nailed it so hard that the bands that came 80 00:04:47,160 --> 00:04:50,730 after them had to start calling themselves Metalcore out of respect. 81 00:04:51,084 --> 00:04:56,984 even that little synopsis is born of a time that has now passed, but was 82 00:04:56,984 --> 00:05:01,504 the moment that we learned about we are noodley hardcore right around 83 00:05:01,504 --> 00:05:07,641 this exact time when all of a sudden blogs and threads and thoughts that 84 00:05:07,641 --> 00:05:11,371 people were beginning to have about lineages of bands were beginning to 85 00:05:11,381 --> 00:05:15,701 be documented on the internet in ways that we could chase down, figure out, 86 00:05:15,711 --> 00:05:18,021 learn about, and then download all of. 87 00:05:18,716 --> 00:05:24,866 And I think even that attitude that we heard in that writing used to be the way 88 00:05:24,866 --> 00:05:28,986 that a lot of bands would write about themselves and their albums, even in that 89 00:05:28,986 --> 00:05:33,506 time, trying to figure out how to give the most kitschy MySpace bio that would 90 00:05:33,506 --> 00:05:37,156 cause you to play some tunes and then hop around on similar artists or whatever. 91 00:05:37,666 --> 00:05:44,626 But like, it's both that quote itself is a good introduction to this band and this 92 00:05:44,626 --> 00:05:47,196 record because it's both in some ways. 93 00:05:47,232 --> 00:05:52,230 manner, factually more or less accurate, and also just like 94 00:05:52,240 --> 00:05:54,140 wildly inappropriate tonally. 95 00:05:54,840 --> 00:05:58,780 And both of those things just live together with glee, uh, anytime 96 00:05:58,780 --> 00:06:00,060 this band pokes its head up. 97 00:06:00,427 --> 00:06:03,617 Kyle: There is a definite you know, two types of people, people who get it 98 00:06:03,617 --> 00:06:08,237 and people who don't thing that lives on in the posture of this band and 99 00:06:08,237 --> 00:06:10,367 is sort of exemplified by this quote. 100 00:06:10,734 --> 00:06:15,464 And that's a theme that kept popping up for me and, you know, if you're under the 101 00:06:15,464 --> 00:06:20,334 age of 25 first of all, welcome, crazy that you're listening to this second of 102 00:06:20,334 --> 00:06:25,964 all it probably sounds farcical on its face, you know, cause if you grew up in 103 00:06:25,964 --> 00:06:30,164 flattened, the flattened cultural context of the internet, like it's, it's almost 104 00:06:30,164 --> 00:06:35,739 passe to say like genres are irrelevant or, you know, you know, regional scenes 105 00:06:35,739 --> 00:06:40,369 are, or whatever, but I guess rest assured at least that I, an older, pit 106 00:06:40,369 --> 00:06:46,299 retired person have always hated this kind of stuff as a word person, and 107 00:06:46,299 --> 00:06:53,979 the like, imagined Berlin Wall between metal people and punk people, and just 108 00:06:54,009 --> 00:06:59,679 like, the word metalcore makes me, makes me want to jump in front of a car. 109 00:07:00,199 --> 00:07:05,190 Um, And it does such a disservice, like so much of the stuff around this 110 00:07:05,190 --> 00:07:10,680 does a disservice to the smartness of a band like Botch and the people in it. 111 00:07:11,000 --> 00:07:14,290 And I think that's where a lot of the pushback and the bristling on 112 00:07:14,290 --> 00:07:19,577 the record came from is like, we're outsiders to the world already. 113 00:07:19,647 --> 00:07:22,227 That's why we've sought out these venues and these weird sounds. 114 00:07:22,247 --> 00:07:25,887 Like why are we doing the same shit inside this room that they're 115 00:07:25,887 --> 00:07:28,147 doing out there outside the doors? 116 00:07:28,147 --> 00:07:30,717 Like guys, can we, can we take a minute and pause until we 117 00:07:30,717 --> 00:07:32,277 can figure out what's going on? 118 00:07:32,907 --> 00:07:36,497 So I, all that to say, no matter what your age, if you're if you're 119 00:07:36,497 --> 00:07:40,232 a little bit of an antagonist or a misanthrope, No matter what the sounds 120 00:07:40,242 --> 00:07:45,282 do to you when you press play on this record, You can at least start with a 121 00:07:45,282 --> 00:07:48,052 posture that there is to appreciate. 122 00:07:48,419 --> 00:07:50,989 That's a little different than anything you're going to get anywhere else. 123 00:07:51,009 --> 00:07:54,639 Cause it's antagonistic, but it's also smart and self assured. 124 00:07:55,309 --> 00:07:57,009 And I think you can sense that in the music. 125 00:07:57,009 --> 00:08:00,719 It's like impossible to separate into any kind of an objective first 126 00:08:00,719 --> 00:08:02,019 impression for us at this point. 127 00:08:02,599 --> 00:08:06,729 But I, I think I want to ascribe that sort of posture and being able to sense 128 00:08:06,729 --> 00:08:11,756 that feeling, connecting to that feeling immediately, tell me more about Botch. 129 00:08:12,115 --> 00:08:15,785 paint more of a picture about this band. 130 00:08:16,152 --> 00:08:20,372 Cliff: We go to the 90s in the Pacific Northwest where nothing was happening in 131 00:08:20,372 --> 00:08:23,602 music at all during that time, for sure. 132 00:08:23,882 --> 00:08:27,122 Certainly nothing that would go on to influence American music. 133 00:08:27,489 --> 00:08:32,859 Uh, in any degree, but yeah, to this, what you just brought up will keep playing 134 00:08:32,859 --> 00:08:38,869 itself out over the history of this band, uh, both in their original active moments 135 00:08:38,869 --> 00:08:43,909 and then in the followup since then but they were formed in Tacoma, Washington in 136 00:08:43,909 --> 00:08:50,219 93, which I always really want to impress when we are talking about bands from 137 00:08:50,219 --> 00:08:52,629 the nineties who were doing sounds that. 138 00:08:53,114 --> 00:08:59,704 Created new genres 10, 20, and 30 years later, because it's very, very difficult 139 00:09:00,004 --> 00:09:04,144 in my opinion, at least I was only one particular age in the 90s, but it's 140 00:09:04,144 --> 00:09:10,501 very difficult to imagine this band, Meshuggah, Dillinger Escape Plan, making 141 00:09:10,501 --> 00:09:15,891 the types of records that they did in a year that started with 19 in it. 142 00:09:16,621 --> 00:09:19,763 It, it feels out of time and strange. 143 00:09:20,103 --> 00:09:21,203 So it's. 144 00:09:21,543 --> 00:09:26,433 Cool enough to think about how out of left field seeming any of this 145 00:09:26,433 --> 00:09:30,233 stuff would be but I have a feeling that it's sort of doubly or triply 146 00:09:30,273 --> 00:09:33,613 the feeling that we're getting these days to have experienced it back then. 147 00:09:33,823 --> 00:09:37,923 You must have felt like a madman listening to something like this 148 00:09:38,023 --> 00:09:39,648 the moment that it came out. 149 00:09:39,808 --> 00:09:42,858 Kyle: totally, it's, are you experienced in 67, right? 150 00:09:42,898 --> 00:09:47,488 Where you're like an alien gave them the, the blueprint for the pyramid. 151 00:09:47,518 --> 00:09:50,648 There's no way this came out of a fucking human body. 152 00:09:51,248 --> 00:09:56,978 And just like 93, man, like Tacoma right down the road from Aberdeen. 153 00:09:57,408 --> 00:09:58,688 Nirvana is blown up. 154 00:09:58,698 --> 00:10:01,108 The Melvins are, I think. 155 00:10:01,455 --> 00:10:04,935 this would have been right before stoner, which so, but like Pacific 156 00:10:04,935 --> 00:10:09,385 Northwest is fully poppin at this point, but not in this way. 157 00:10:09,505 --> 00:10:15,845 Like it's, it is the grunge moment and they started and were influenced 158 00:10:15,875 --> 00:10:21,892 by like more 80s stuff, but the hold that like punk, truly punk culture, 159 00:10:22,259 --> 00:10:24,449 uh, and like post punky stuff. 160 00:10:24,849 --> 00:10:30,849 almost had on this area is, is like just anthropologically really cool to me. 161 00:10:31,216 --> 00:10:34,386 You know, they were all, all fighting back against the rednecks 162 00:10:34,466 --> 00:10:36,236 up in that area at the time. 163 00:10:36,876 --> 00:10:38,956 It's, it's a culture of a bygone era. 164 00:10:39,246 --> 00:10:41,456 It's just, it's so interesting. 165 00:10:41,823 --> 00:10:42,323 Cliff: For sure. 166 00:10:42,383 --> 00:10:46,743 And like Melvin's, which, you know, we spent a lot of time in 167 00:10:46,743 --> 00:10:50,143 the episode about Melvin Melvin's that we did years ago about how 168 00:10:50,143 --> 00:10:51,533 much of a Rosetta Stone they are. 169 00:10:51,533 --> 00:10:55,603 And so here that is again right influencing bands that don't 170 00:10:55,613 --> 00:11:00,938 necessarily sound like them, but certainly share a certain approach 171 00:11:01,328 --> 00:11:04,438 to antagonism at all possible times. 172 00:11:04,718 --> 00:11:07,448 Because yeah, like, like you were mentioning, you know, in the early 173 00:11:07,448 --> 00:11:11,428 90s, that would have been, you know, Stoner Witch was 94, Houdini was 93. 174 00:11:11,688 --> 00:11:15,488 So they were already uh, gaining what they would gain as the band Melvins. 175 00:11:15,908 --> 00:11:20,168 But for like Botch specifically, it was sort of a double edged 176 00:11:20,168 --> 00:11:24,048 sword and you read a lot about this in retrospective now, but. 177 00:11:24,393 --> 00:11:29,293 Effectively, at the time, like, they were seen as not playing especially accessible 178 00:11:29,303 --> 00:11:32,643 music, which will not shock a lot of people who may not be familiar with the 179 00:11:32,653 --> 00:11:37,433 band, right, but like, the degree to which you become inaccessible when you're 180 00:11:37,433 --> 00:11:44,388 already an offshoot of a burgeoning punk scene is, like, An interesting threshold 181 00:11:44,398 --> 00:11:49,788 to kind of figure out, like, who, hold on if punk is a whole collective thing 182 00:11:49,788 --> 00:11:54,488 where we're sort of saying there's nothing that doesn't belong, who is it that's 183 00:11:54,488 --> 00:11:59,088 all of a sudden making the wall that says Botch is on the other side of it? 184 00:12:00,608 --> 00:12:04,568 We, we don't really know, but what we see from Botch in those years is, 185 00:12:04,738 --> 00:12:06,138 they were pissed at whoever it was. 186 00:12:06,508 --> 00:12:09,078 Whoever defended that wall, they fucking hated them. 187 00:12:09,418 --> 00:12:14,158 And so they were consistently sort of being treated as outsiders and then also 188 00:12:14,743 --> 00:12:18,613 Made sure to act like outsiders, uh, at every possible chance they could. 189 00:12:18,833 --> 00:12:22,053 Made fun of overly serious hardcore and punk scenes. 190 00:12:22,363 --> 00:12:26,783 I mean, there are a million touchstones for all this as we talk 191 00:12:26,793 --> 00:12:28,743 about this record and this band. 192 00:12:28,743 --> 00:12:32,513 But I mean, everything from the way shows were booked to the way that 193 00:12:32,513 --> 00:12:34,333 they made merch and sold merch. 194 00:12:34,363 --> 00:12:36,183 The designs of their t shirt. 195 00:12:36,433 --> 00:12:38,793 The way that they released records after they broke up as a 196 00:12:38,828 --> 00:12:42,948 Kyle: go Google the, go Google Botch boy band shirt right now. 197 00:12:42,948 --> 00:12:48,988 So merch in punk history. 198 00:12:49,683 --> 00:12:55,183 That and the chat pile, glass, grimace, smoking a bong are my two favorite pieces 199 00:12:55,183 --> 00:12:57,073 of merch probably ever in punk history. 200 00:12:57,440 --> 00:13:00,710 Cliff: Neither of them currently approved for working remotely 201 00:13:00,780 --> 00:13:02,890 where my shirt is in the camera. 202 00:13:05,610 --> 00:13:06,180 But I can wear 203 00:13:06,265 --> 00:13:08,575 Kyle: I'm off camera and I can't tell you why. 204 00:13:10,130 --> 00:13:12,910 Cliff: My shirt is too cool for this meeting and I'm very 205 00:13:13,235 --> 00:13:14,305 Kyle: Isn't it pride month? 206 00:13:14,305 --> 00:13:15,285 Fuck you guys. 207 00:13:16,495 --> 00:13:18,495 Doesn't Lockheed Martin support? 208 00:13:18,535 --> 00:13:22,915 Don't we have a rainbow LinkedIn right now? 209 00:13:25,573 --> 00:13:30,293 Cliff: So even back then, right, some, some other examples of this Me and you 210 00:13:30,293 --> 00:13:34,933 laugh about this a lot because it has become such a normal thing that it's no 211 00:13:34,933 --> 00:13:39,383 longer a surprising bit But like we'll see weird bands weird local or small 212 00:13:39,383 --> 00:13:42,773 or heavy bands or whatever play shows And especially if they're the headliner 213 00:13:42,773 --> 00:13:46,803 and seem to have any control over The music that gets played in between 214 00:13:46,803 --> 00:13:48,763 before the band comes up like nowadays. 215 00:13:48,763 --> 00:13:53,418 It's just like that Basically, as ironic as you can possibly be is the move, right? 216 00:13:53,598 --> 00:13:56,698 You are either at that point making a sincere statement about an 217 00:13:56,698 --> 00:14:00,738 obscure piece of music, or you're being intentionally obtuse and 218 00:14:00,738 --> 00:14:02,108 playing something that doesn't fit. 219 00:14:02,268 --> 00:14:05,788 And like, that's become a normal, expected move. 220 00:14:06,008 --> 00:14:08,548 This is the kind of shit that Botch did then. 221 00:14:08,963 --> 00:14:13,923 In the 90s, intentionally to like, throw off any vibes of like, overly 222 00:14:13,933 --> 00:14:18,603 serious pretension towards what it is that we are about to do. 223 00:14:18,903 --> 00:14:23,513 Which is basically to make well, discordant noise at seemingly random 224 00:14:23,553 --> 00:14:27,253 intervals for a really long time with high energy until we're done. 225 00:14:28,303 --> 00:14:34,073 Kyle: But it was a signal that it's about energy and momentum and release, not about 226 00:14:34,543 --> 00:14:38,593 aggression or, masculinity or whatever. 227 00:14:39,103 --> 00:14:45,223 And, and we have two really recent examples, like the big one that I think 228 00:14:45,233 --> 00:14:48,643 about a lot is turnstile playing, I want to dance with somebody and everybody's 229 00:14:48,643 --> 00:14:50,663 singing along right before they go on. 230 00:14:51,123 --> 00:14:53,823 But then we saw he is legend for the I am Hollywood shows. 231 00:14:54,373 --> 00:14:59,933 Like a week or two ago and they played, um, what's that Shania song? 232 00:14:59,943 --> 00:15:02,673 Man, I feel like a woman and everybody's saying along there too. 233 00:15:02,673 --> 00:15:03,083 And like 234 00:15:03,383 --> 00:15:03,963 Cliff: course we did. 235 00:15:04,073 --> 00:15:09,862 Kyle: Only with, with forebearers like Botch, would that moment be 236 00:15:10,312 --> 00:15:12,612 not only acceptable but commonplace. 237 00:15:13,104 --> 00:15:18,781 Cliff: Then, kind of contextually, for Botch as a band, but also the 238 00:15:18,851 --> 00:15:22,551 type of music that they were creating that was considered to be not entirely 239 00:15:22,551 --> 00:15:24,431 accessible to those scenes even then. 240 00:15:24,711 --> 00:15:30,021 1999 and, right there at the end of 99 and then into 2000. 241 00:15:30,051 --> 00:15:32,661 Again, this record was technically released like right at the end of 242 00:15:32,671 --> 00:15:37,601 99 but seems to have had a little bit of a period to where people will 243 00:15:37,601 --> 00:15:39,311 talk about it being released in 2000. 244 00:15:39,521 --> 00:15:40,201 But either way. 245 00:15:40,568 --> 00:15:45,119 Right at that time you've got Man, here's a real like vignette into my life. 246 00:15:45,439 --> 00:15:48,979 We're gonna list off some things that some people will know deeply and other people 247 00:15:48,979 --> 00:15:51,569 will go, What in the hell are you talking 248 00:15:51,854 --> 00:15:53,924 Kyle: First group is small, but deep. 249 00:15:54,394 --> 00:15:55,404 Second group is much 250 00:15:55,663 --> 00:15:56,487 Cliff: ha ha! 251 00:15:56,487 --> 00:15:56,899 ha! 252 00:15:56,899 --> 00:15:57,339 Yup! 253 00:15:58,069 --> 00:16:03,234 So, 1999 especially was really crazy for hardcore. 254 00:16:03,234 --> 00:16:07,634 In general, we have, we are the Romans, we have Calculating Infinity. 255 00:16:07,954 --> 00:16:09,974 We have the Red Sea from ISIS. 256 00:16:09,984 --> 00:16:13,394 We got the Poacher Diaries from Colette or, uh, from Converge. 257 00:16:13,394 --> 00:16:13,764 Sorry. 258 00:16:14,124 --> 00:16:17,154 And then not long before that, right, was, were Coalice Records. 259 00:16:17,374 --> 00:16:20,144 Candiria was another band that came out during this time that 260 00:16:20,144 --> 00:16:21,604 was doing some pretty crazy stuff. 261 00:16:21,654 --> 00:16:27,494 Bands were experimenting with finding ways to become technical, but without having 262 00:16:27,494 --> 00:16:29,664 to explain the technical complexity of it. 263 00:16:31,359 --> 00:16:36,719 They were exploring ways to make complicated music without ever 264 00:16:36,719 --> 00:16:40,349 having to have really a rubric for deciphering it on the other end. 265 00:16:40,719 --> 00:16:44,219 It just sort of like, the more you hear about the way Botch wrote this 266 00:16:44,219 --> 00:16:47,039 record and then a lot of the other bands who were writing similar music 267 00:16:47,089 --> 00:16:51,319 people just got a weird itch and then made it weirder and weirder and weirder 268 00:16:51,319 --> 00:16:54,979 and weirder until something had a very odd time signature that felt cool 269 00:16:54,979 --> 00:16:56,869 overall and then put that shit on tape. 270 00:16:56,969 --> 00:16:57,349 We're done. 271 00:16:57,692 --> 00:17:00,892 no one is counting out all the beats to start with and then subdividing 272 00:17:00,902 --> 00:17:04,562 them up with intention in a songwriting or composition type manner. 273 00:17:04,762 --> 00:17:07,932 Kyle: You know, when you put this point in the outline, it got me thinking, like, was 274 00:17:07,932 --> 00:17:11,942 it just hardcore that had a moment in 99? 275 00:17:12,282 --> 00:17:17,162 But it's easy to forget because we're a quarter century on from 276 00:17:17,162 --> 00:17:22,787 it, but like 99 was sort of a Feeling culture change moment in 277 00:17:22,787 --> 00:17:25,067 general and like popular culture. 278 00:17:25,227 --> 00:17:27,917 And Brian cook mentioned this in an interview when they were 279 00:17:27,917 --> 00:17:29,187 recording, we are the Romans. 280 00:17:29,247 --> 00:17:31,417 Nuki was on MTV like every half hour. 281 00:17:31,417 --> 00:17:35,567 He said, he was like, it was astonishing to me that this song was popular, but like 282 00:17:36,297 --> 00:17:40,727 heavy music, that heavy music was popular, but also that it was like the dumbest 283 00:17:40,727 --> 00:17:41,987 shit you'd ever heard in your life. 284 00:17:41,987 --> 00:17:44,297 I caveat my biscuit fan, whatever. 285 00:17:44,647 --> 00:17:44,667 Yeah. 286 00:17:45,792 --> 00:17:50,662 But it reminded me also of when we talked about Rated R by Queens, like, you 287 00:17:50,662 --> 00:17:52,522 know, my probably favorite record ever. 288 00:17:52,922 --> 00:17:56,942 And that was sort of a pushback to Nu Metal as well, and like a sort of 289 00:17:56,942 --> 00:17:59,102 a coarsening of the cultural sphere. 290 00:17:59,552 --> 00:18:01,842 That that came out in mid 2000. 291 00:18:01,842 --> 00:18:04,926 And then Stankonia by Outkast came out. 292 00:18:05,147 --> 00:18:11,797 October of 2000, sort of in response to the narrowing over 10 window of what was 293 00:18:11,797 --> 00:18:13,777 acceptable in hip hop music at the time. 294 00:18:14,147 --> 00:18:18,307 And so it's really interesting to me that you have this like end of the 295 00:18:18,307 --> 00:18:22,757 millennium sort of fear and paranoia about what the next century is going to be. 296 00:18:23,027 --> 00:18:26,997 And we squeeze all this juice out of the end of the millennium, 297 00:18:26,997 --> 00:18:28,497 like right at the wire. 298 00:18:28,807 --> 00:18:31,387 And that goes for like artists and counterculturists of all 299 00:18:31,387 --> 00:18:35,588 stripes and, and punk is like peak counterculture in our opinion. 300 00:18:35,588 --> 00:18:39,148 So, I like looking at it through like more of an intersectional 301 00:18:39,158 --> 00:18:41,578 lens too, but yeah, holy shit. 302 00:18:41,578 --> 00:18:46,798 Just in the heavy music we did 30 or 40 years worth of progress in heavy music 303 00:18:46,798 --> 00:18:48,588 and a calendar year, which was awesome. 304 00:18:48,963 --> 00:18:51,763 Cliff: Yeah, I had never thought of it before this moment but yeah you're 305 00:18:51,763 --> 00:18:55,723 right I can see lots of other examples, including the moment that was weird 306 00:18:55,723 --> 00:19:01,023 for me when I, even though what I mean, 1999 we're in middle school right. 307 00:19:01,333 --> 00:19:03,263 So, my brain is. 308 00:19:03,613 --> 00:19:09,163 Pre waking up to reality I would still say at that point, but like I 309 00:19:09,163 --> 00:19:14,048 remember that this'll This will knock me down a few pegs in anyone's brain. 310 00:19:14,158 --> 00:19:17,398 In 99, the fundamental elements of South Town by P. 311 00:19:17,398 --> 00:19:17,538 O. 312 00:19:17,538 --> 00:19:17,868 D. 313 00:19:17,888 --> 00:19:22,678 came out, and if anyone just responded viscerally to that, mention just 314 00:19:22,688 --> 00:19:26,048 for a second, hold on, I'm not saying the whole thing was crazy. 315 00:19:26,358 --> 00:19:32,438 What I recalled in that moment, though, was like, South Town, the song, was big. 316 00:19:32,858 --> 00:19:34,978 And it's a hardcore song. 317 00:19:35,281 --> 00:19:35,841 Kyle: Mm hmm. 318 00:19:35,960 --> 00:19:39,300 Cliff: it's hooky, yes, it's got DJ stuff, all that, for sure, 319 00:19:39,330 --> 00:19:41,120 but like, it's a heavy song. 320 00:19:41,670 --> 00:19:46,080 And like, they were sneaking in some kind of slammy metal type stuff. 321 00:19:46,390 --> 00:19:52,080 Not only into, again, not only into the sort of popular, But at 322 00:19:52,080 --> 00:19:56,210 that point, I mean, they're shoving that into Christian music stores. 323 00:19:56,620 --> 00:20:00,440 And so all of a sudden now that's meeting up with, you know, and if you 324 00:20:00,440 --> 00:20:04,500 want to know about this little branch, right, we did the Norma Jean episode and 325 00:20:04,500 --> 00:20:05,890 we'll walk you right up to that line. 326 00:20:05,890 --> 00:20:08,650 And you can take that line further in our other episode if you want. 327 00:20:08,650 --> 00:20:13,570 But like, yeah, to your point, like all of a sudden heavy music started finding 328 00:20:13,570 --> 00:20:15,350 footings in a bunch of different places. 329 00:20:15,717 --> 00:20:18,617 And even though we're maybe projecting this onto it, it does 330 00:20:18,617 --> 00:20:22,327 seem like all of a sudden a lot of bands went, nah, I can be weird too. 331 00:20:22,617 --> 00:20:23,337 Let's do it. 332 00:20:23,704 --> 00:20:25,704 Let's get especially odd. 333 00:20:26,594 --> 00:20:26,924 Right. 334 00:20:26,984 --> 00:20:30,084 And then we had Behold the Arctopus, which is what happens when you 335 00:20:30,084 --> 00:20:31,824 don't let people reel it back in. 336 00:20:32,039 --> 00:20:35,269 Kyle: Did you know, I didn't realize until just this exact moment, the Battle 337 00:20:35,269 --> 00:20:38,839 of Los Angeles by Rage was released the same day as We Are the Romans. 338 00:20:39,324 --> 00:20:39,594 Cliff: Yep. 339 00:20:39,604 --> 00:20:39,914 Okay. 340 00:20:39,914 --> 00:20:42,244 We're putting some pieces together in this puzzle, aren't we? 341 00:20:42,244 --> 00:20:43,634 Yeah, for sure. 342 00:20:43,809 --> 00:20:48,716 Kyle: but again, internet convergence culture makes it so easy to see how a 343 00:20:48,716 --> 00:20:53,866 bunch of stuff stacked up in a day, but when all we have is our like, pubescent 344 00:20:53,906 --> 00:20:57,736 memories of these things, they all existed in separate cultural lanes. 345 00:20:57,736 --> 00:21:02,465 And so it's like, the Slim Shady LP came out around the same time, came 346 00:21:02,465 --> 00:21:06,165 out around the same time as Battle of Los Angeles, and then came out around 347 00:21:06,175 --> 00:21:08,575 the same time as We Are the Romans. 348 00:21:08,942 --> 00:21:09,572 Crazy. 349 00:21:09,939 --> 00:21:10,239 Cliff: Yeah. 350 00:21:10,606 --> 00:21:15,026 But then specific to, you know, that, whatever kind of subgenre or 351 00:21:15,026 --> 00:21:18,426 scene you could discover, you know, to that point about the internet and 352 00:21:18,446 --> 00:21:25,253 the way that it was changing then, finding Botch specifically, and 353 00:21:25,620 --> 00:21:29,080 to this day, I think it's hard to think back to this moment, right? 354 00:21:29,514 --> 00:21:34,034 When I heard transitions from persona to object, I was like, THIS? 355 00:21:34,744 --> 00:21:35,834 Makes sense to me. 356 00:21:35,834 --> 00:21:38,494 I know we've talked about this before in other episodes like with Meshuggah, 357 00:21:38,744 --> 00:21:43,854 but like, there was a part of me that connected to music in a new way the 358 00:21:43,854 --> 00:21:47,904 first time I ever heard that really particular riff in a really similar 359 00:21:47,904 --> 00:21:52,694 way that like 43 percent burnt by Dillinger's skate plan will do it. 360 00:21:53,029 --> 00:21:57,509 all of a sudden you realize like something in my body and my psyche 361 00:21:57,569 --> 00:22:00,779 loves The way you just did a rhythm 362 00:22:00,989 --> 00:22:01,499 Kyle: Mm hmm. 363 00:22:01,949 --> 00:22:05,809 Cliff: The way you just made that unnecessarily hard to follow, but then 364 00:22:05,809 --> 00:22:11,629 I figured out how And now I can just repeat it and repeat it like I felt dialed 365 00:22:11,659 --> 00:22:17,424 into something In a way that I Really hadn't dialed into music before then 366 00:22:17,424 --> 00:22:22,224 despite wanting to study it and love it and learn from it already It's like the 367 00:22:22,234 --> 00:22:25,694 closest I would get to something like that before that point was like, you 368 00:22:25,694 --> 00:22:31,214 know, led zeppelin something that was about depth and mastery and proficiency 369 00:22:31,224 --> 00:22:35,554 and production and like Things that just had you know stories and thought and 370 00:22:35,554 --> 00:22:40,699 complexity for days and years and instead this was like This doesn't feel like 371 00:22:40,699 --> 00:22:43,539 that, though, but it's still really cool. 372 00:22:43,629 --> 00:22:43,939 Kyle: Yeah. 373 00:22:44,240 --> 00:22:45,020 Cliff: Thank you, Blox. 374 00:22:45,158 --> 00:22:51,517 And As well, like during that time this actually came out from Hydra 375 00:22:51,537 --> 00:22:55,717 Head Records, which is another, again, moment to see all the places that 376 00:22:55,717 --> 00:22:57,077 things were spiderwebbing out, right? 377 00:22:57,077 --> 00:23:00,947 Because Hydra Head was started by Aaron Turner, Aaron Turner having 378 00:23:00,947 --> 00:23:05,667 been the frontman of ISIS and now SUMAC and a lot of other really cool 379 00:23:05,667 --> 00:23:09,167 projects, who's also just like a really cool artist in his own right. 380 00:23:09,167 --> 00:23:13,522 But you know, Hydra Head at that time was putting out, again, Check this list, man, 381 00:23:13,542 --> 00:23:20,042 like Isis, Botch, Converge, Coalesce, Boris, Jesu, Kayo Dot, Cave In, like 382 00:23:20,312 --> 00:23:25,942 just records on records on records that would become if you just took that list 383 00:23:26,062 --> 00:23:31,182 and you took every record from the every band I just mentioned in five seconds you 384 00:23:31,182 --> 00:23:35,517 can find Hundreds or thousands of people who are like, that's my favorite record 385 00:23:35,517 --> 00:23:37,637 and I love it so much I would die for 386 00:23:37,637 --> 00:23:37,797 it. 387 00:23:38,217 --> 00:23:44,187 Like it's an important piece of music to me And in some of these just a handful of 388 00:23:44,187 --> 00:23:49,197 record labels were just like putting out things that would you know have all this 389 00:23:49,397 --> 00:23:56,554 Kyle: It's, I mean, there were a lot of great labels, like, Ipecac, amphetamine 390 00:23:56,554 --> 00:24:03,344 reptile, like cool, cool, heavy, weird, whatever stuff in the nineties. 391 00:24:03,714 --> 00:24:10,400 But for my money, Hydra head was like the a 24 of seen stuff at that time. 392 00:24:10,400 --> 00:24:13,340 Where it's like, I will go check it out. 393 00:24:13,380 --> 00:24:14,600 Sight unseen. 394 00:24:15,245 --> 00:24:19,905 Because it's so well curated and it's so good. 395 00:24:20,105 --> 00:24:23,235 So like, shout out to Aaron Turner for being a consistent 396 00:24:23,275 --> 00:24:26,025 tastemaker for over 20 years. 397 00:24:26,392 --> 00:24:29,672 And being really uncompromising about that. 398 00:24:30,022 --> 00:24:35,222 Like, Hydra Head, you and I personally owe a lot. 399 00:24:35,589 --> 00:24:39,119 And I know, to your point, thousands of people would say the same thing. 400 00:24:39,909 --> 00:24:42,641 And like, that kind of an impact is so cool. 401 00:24:42,931 --> 00:24:44,631 So cool and seismic. 402 00:24:44,998 --> 00:24:45,908 Cliff: It really is. 403 00:24:45,958 --> 00:24:46,688 It really is. 404 00:24:46,888 --> 00:24:51,228 And you know, Man, moments like this, sorry for an overly earnest aside, 405 00:24:51,248 --> 00:24:56,845 so early in the episode, but like, Thinking about moments like this Will 406 00:24:56,845 --> 00:25:01,781 sometimes, like, really kind of throw my spirit into a weird moment Of What 407 00:25:01,781 --> 00:25:05,941 is the little small thing that I have an itch to do that feels like it won't 408 00:25:05,951 --> 00:25:11,581 matter but could potentially have like a seismic dent in the universe level? 409 00:25:12,296 --> 00:25:17,446 Type of shift or cause people to see things or experience things 410 00:25:17,456 --> 00:25:20,116 differently in such a cool direction. 411 00:25:20,366 --> 00:25:25,606 And like Aaron Turner and Jake Bannon, both are people who are like, you 412 00:25:25,606 --> 00:25:27,966 just watch them having done things. 413 00:25:28,156 --> 00:25:32,706 And you go, Oh my God, like you've created more culture than I'll ever 414 00:25:32,706 --> 00:25:35,066 experience in my whole lifetime. 415 00:25:35,346 --> 00:25:35,566 Just 416 00:25:35,931 --> 00:25:39,941 Kyle: He says with a Jacob Bannon artwork directly behind his head. 417 00:25:40,111 --> 00:25:40,831 Cliff: Yes. 418 00:25:42,031 --> 00:25:42,721 Yes. 419 00:25:43,191 --> 00:25:49,051 Be because in, in a in a sincere way, people like that really inspire me. 420 00:25:49,291 --> 00:25:55,178 Like the, there doesn't seem to be a high threshold for the pretense of the thing. 421 00:25:55,298 --> 00:25:57,968 The thing doesn't have to be so important before you do it. 422 00:25:58,118 --> 00:26:01,808 They just sort of do it because it's in the lane of the art that they've 423 00:26:01,808 --> 00:26:04,118 created or that they want to create. 424 00:26:05,158 --> 00:26:05,548 I don't know. 425 00:26:05,548 --> 00:26:08,708 I just I have a sinking feeling that if you talk to either of 426 00:26:08,708 --> 00:26:11,348 them about it They would never have the foresight to tell you. 427 00:26:11,348 --> 00:26:14,308 Yeah, I knew that was going to make a huge difference I knew I should start 428 00:26:14,518 --> 00:26:18,238 hydra head records and put these weird bands out because I knew it would 429 00:26:18,968 --> 00:26:24,678 Change the landscape of music Over the coming decades, but it happened 430 00:26:25,045 --> 00:26:27,575 because they wanted to and then it did 431 00:26:27,966 --> 00:26:32,908 Kyle: I, it resonates with people because the start and end of the ethos is I 432 00:26:32,908 --> 00:26:37,658 want, I wanted to find a little bit of a lane that didn't exist that like 433 00:26:37,958 --> 00:26:42,758 spiritually evokes some of the things that I grew up loving and being inspired by. 434 00:26:42,758 --> 00:26:49,728 But like, I want to find my own way To express those things, and I just want 435 00:26:49,728 --> 00:26:53,145 to do it, I will do it, no matter what. 436 00:26:53,615 --> 00:26:55,865 It's not product market fit bullshit. 437 00:26:55,895 --> 00:26:57,990 It's not tech guy on LinkedIn. 438 00:26:57,990 --> 00:27:00,365 Sociopathic depravity. 439 00:27:00,685 --> 00:27:05,322 It's, I would do this if it put me in a tent, and I had to 440 00:27:05,322 --> 00:27:06,852 live on the streets to do this. 441 00:27:07,272 --> 00:27:12,437 They all, All the guys like that have evolved really beautifully and they're 442 00:27:12,867 --> 00:27:18,727 like, there is a mix of pragmatism or whatever that allows them to keep evolving 443 00:27:18,727 --> 00:27:22,107 and growing and finding new ways to reach people and connect with people. 444 00:27:22,107 --> 00:27:25,607 But I think at the end of the day, it's like, I just want to be around things 445 00:27:25,607 --> 00:27:28,857 that I really believe in and I want to make things that I really believe in. 446 00:27:29,317 --> 00:27:32,797 One of the, one of the dudes in Botch in one of the interviews had the quote, 447 00:27:32,807 --> 00:27:36,667 you know, I, I'd rather be proud of what I did than rich in my twenties. 448 00:27:37,327 --> 00:27:39,757 And they're like all the Hydra headbands. 449 00:27:40,467 --> 00:27:45,747 I, there is a sense of pride of like, well, no matter what happened, we made the 450 00:27:45,747 --> 00:27:50,277 best and most original stuff we possibly could and didn't cave into a zeitgeist. 451 00:27:50,727 --> 00:27:53,827 We tried to find our own voice and, you know, at the end of our 452 00:27:53,827 --> 00:27:55,077 lives, that's all we can ask for. 453 00:27:55,444 --> 00:28:00,621 Cliff: Yeah, so we can take that little nugget with us, but even that plays out 454 00:28:00,631 --> 00:28:05,741 in the way that Botch got connected to Hydra head at all to create this record 455 00:28:05,741 --> 00:28:09,768 and then we can kind of talk some more about the music itself but Aaron Turner 456 00:28:09,768 --> 00:28:15,108 contacted Botch and asked him to put a song on a compilation that Hydra Head 457 00:28:15,108 --> 00:28:19,148 wanted to put out called In These Black Days, which is a whole bunch of Black 458 00:28:19,148 --> 00:28:23,588 Sabbath cover albums, uh, released as a series of split singles, which for 459 00:28:23,588 --> 00:28:27,338 what it's worth was more innovative back in the day than our current, 460 00:28:27,788 --> 00:28:29,868 uh, hellscape of music distribution. 461 00:28:30,178 --> 00:28:34,613 But, so, Botch recorded a cover of The Wizard, which is just, uh, Unironically, 462 00:28:34,613 --> 00:28:36,383 my favorite Black Sabbath song anyway. 463 00:28:36,623 --> 00:28:40,313 But they recorded a cover of that, sent sent it to Aaron Turner along with a demo. 464 00:28:40,523 --> 00:28:44,853 And now we, uh, now we're going to release a Botched record. 465 00:28:44,853 --> 00:28:45,383 Okay. 466 00:28:45,713 --> 00:28:46,113 Yeah. 467 00:28:46,143 --> 00:28:48,953 Like whatever this band is doing, everybody was on board with. 468 00:28:49,643 --> 00:28:55,883 But like, so many earnest, tiny connections like that are cool and have 469 00:28:55,993 --> 00:29:01,298 such a uniqueness to them down to like, The fact that, uh, a Black Sabbath cover 470 00:29:01,298 --> 00:29:06,388 would connect these people when, you know, one of the ways that Coalesce got 471 00:29:06,398 --> 00:29:09,988 through certain periods of their career was from a Led Zeppelin's cover record. 472 00:29:10,218 --> 00:29:15,285 There's just a, you, if you make the mistake, as we go along, 473 00:29:15,535 --> 00:29:19,675 of thinking everything here is non serious, you'll miss it. 474 00:29:19,995 --> 00:29:23,275 But if you think everything is serious, you'll miss it too, because it's not. 475 00:29:23,642 --> 00:29:29,222 But like, You don't record Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin covers, you don't talk 476 00:29:29,232 --> 00:29:33,742 to people in the scene who clearly care about bands and putting out innovative 477 00:29:33,752 --> 00:29:38,612 material, unless you, at some particular and personal level, give a deep shit 478 00:29:38,902 --> 00:29:40,842 about something that you're doing. 479 00:29:41,202 --> 00:29:46,312 But Botcha's ploy seems to have always been We're never gonna quite let you 480 00:29:46,312 --> 00:29:51,332 in on exactly what that means, and your only invitation is to come to a bot show. 481 00:29:51,699 --> 00:29:55,819 At which point we'll probably troll you but that's still the only place to get it. 482 00:29:56,186 --> 00:29:56,576 Kyle: Agreed. 483 00:29:58,234 --> 00:30:02,464 Cliff: Ah, carrying on the vibe of the Melvins, no matter what, in 484 00:30:02,464 --> 00:30:04,254 every possible aspect of reality. 485 00:30:04,804 --> 00:30:10,071 So Okay, one thing we've been doing in recent Toondig episodes that 486 00:30:10,161 --> 00:30:12,591 will work really cool here, I think. 487 00:30:12,811 --> 00:30:17,821 One of the things we talk about is how do you start by taking in a record like 488 00:30:17,821 --> 00:30:22,651 this, especially if it's one that you haven't heard before, or you haven't 489 00:30:22,651 --> 00:30:27,281 heard in a long time, or isn't generally in your kind of sphere of things you're 490 00:30:27,281 --> 00:30:33,346 naturally going to turn on, unless we make you and, I think this one's, this 491 00:30:33,346 --> 00:30:37,816 is a really important aspect of music like this, and we sort of talked about 492 00:30:37,816 --> 00:30:42,966 it a bit with Meshuggah but, you know, being able to approach this with an open 493 00:30:42,966 --> 00:30:48,126 mind is important but there are some ways I think we can kind of guide your 494 00:30:48,126 --> 00:30:54,583 open mind through it as, um, experienced listeners of well, just perversely 495 00:30:54,583 --> 00:30:56,523 decadent music I think we can help. 496 00:30:56,973 --> 00:30:57,253 So. 497 00:30:57,828 --> 00:31:01,658 To that end, I'd be curious then Kyle, like what either kind of surprises 498 00:31:01,658 --> 00:31:04,498 you about this record, thinking about it as someone listening to it for the 499 00:31:04,498 --> 00:31:08,448 first time, or like paying a lot of attention to it, uh, as we have in prep 500 00:31:08,448 --> 00:31:13,508 here or otherwise like some guidance or context on thinking about this, if it's 501 00:31:13,518 --> 00:31:14,978 not normally within your wheelhouse. 502 00:31:15,320 --> 00:31:18,750 Kyle: Yeah I think for a number of reasons, this exercise is especially 503 00:31:18,750 --> 00:31:25,137 important in this episode with this album for a couple of reasons, One, 504 00:31:25,887 --> 00:31:29,687 like if the Olivia Rodrigo episode brought you to this point with us 505 00:31:30,327 --> 00:31:34,597 in some rare way or something else like that sun house, I don't know. 506 00:31:35,077 --> 00:31:39,697 You're gonna, maybe there's a chance that you'll turn this on and within 10 seconds 507 00:31:39,697 --> 00:31:41,247 hit the pause button and be like, Nope. 508 00:31:41,614 --> 00:31:42,414 I'm going to go get a beer. 509 00:31:42,414 --> 00:31:43,414 Keep on living my life. 510 00:31:44,106 --> 00:31:46,106 on the other end of the spectrum. 511 00:31:46,821 --> 00:31:48,491 There is a lot of hype. 512 00:31:48,921 --> 00:31:51,891 There's a lot of cliched writing, which I, you know, have already talked 513 00:31:51,901 --> 00:31:57,221 about my disdain for, but this album is enshrined, you know, like you, you 514 00:31:57,251 --> 00:32:02,771 mentioned to me before how many places this appears on like best albums of 515 00:32:02,781 --> 00:32:05,351 the end of the millennium or whatever. 516 00:32:05,681 --> 00:32:08,311 Like they've been called revolutionaries. 517 00:32:08,621 --> 00:32:11,211 It, it has a true hall of fame place. 518 00:32:11,221 --> 00:32:18,341 So it's like very easy to throw all that in, into your like goggles 519 00:32:18,491 --> 00:32:21,771 before you listen and be like, there's something I'm supposed to get, like 520 00:32:22,281 --> 00:32:24,091 a lot of other people get this thing. 521 00:32:24,111 --> 00:32:28,601 I need to get it, whatever, whatever happens when I listen, I need to 522 00:32:28,611 --> 00:32:32,421 get it and then go to a show and be like, yeah, of course I love Botch. 523 00:32:32,997 --> 00:32:35,517 I would do my best to do away with. 524 00:32:35,902 --> 00:32:40,362 Any of those preconceived notions and try really hard to listen for the first time. 525 00:32:40,392 --> 00:32:43,882 Even if you have listened to this before, even if you're a Botch fan, 526 00:32:43,892 --> 00:32:46,742 like even if you're listening to this episode because you love the band 527 00:32:46,762 --> 00:32:48,132 because you saw the reunion tour. 528 00:32:48,482 --> 00:32:51,902 If you're in the camp like us we wish we could, I would dare to 529 00:32:51,902 --> 00:32:55,842 say, experience the feeling of this record for the first time again. 530 00:32:56,275 --> 00:32:58,995 I think there's three things that stand out for me. 531 00:32:59,415 --> 00:33:01,605 The first thing is the energy, right? 532 00:33:01,975 --> 00:33:06,875 At the risk of, at the risk of sounding like all the writers that 533 00:33:06,875 --> 00:33:08,935 I, I hate talking about this record. 534 00:33:09,445 --> 00:33:12,855 The first thing that you're going to notice is like a force of nature feeling 535 00:33:12,905 --> 00:33:19,665 right, like immediately first notes right out of the gate, and it's just, 536 00:33:20,005 --> 00:33:23,385 it's like downhill skiing on a black diamond or something, or like having a 537 00:33:23,385 --> 00:33:25,415 hurricane come directly at your face. 538 00:33:26,015 --> 00:33:28,865 Um, and I won't, I promise I won't do any more shitty similes. 539 00:33:30,837 --> 00:33:31,527 but like. 540 00:33:31,669 --> 00:33:36,079 To be able, the human ability to be able to bottle a thing like that, that's 541 00:33:36,079 --> 00:33:41,369 inside of you and just like throw a lightning bolt with your hand is amazing. 542 00:33:41,769 --> 00:33:45,436 And no matter what kind of music you're into or what kind of stuff you 543 00:33:45,436 --> 00:33:48,896 like in the world just try to hop on that horse and grab it right away. 544 00:33:49,376 --> 00:33:52,286 The second thing is like, there's a lot going on noise wise. 545 00:33:52,801 --> 00:33:59,591 But there's a tightness, you, I, I will use an I statement, never doubt the band's 546 00:33:59,591 --> 00:34:01,891 control over the chaos for a second. 547 00:34:02,491 --> 00:34:06,971 Frequency Ass Bandit is a really great example of that for me where it like, 548 00:34:07,071 --> 00:34:09,951 it can be really choppy and abrupt. 549 00:34:10,191 --> 00:34:11,791 But they're, they're in control. 550 00:34:11,791 --> 00:34:13,421 They're riding the lightning the whole time. 551 00:34:14,601 --> 00:34:19,571 And then similarly, the third thing is, is dynamics and space and tone. 552 00:34:20,101 --> 00:34:25,711 One thing that sets them apart from a lot of their peers of the time was not 553 00:34:25,711 --> 00:34:32,461 only the like nirvana, loud, quiet, loud thing that they do so well, and it doesn't 554 00:34:32,461 --> 00:34:36,281 feel jarring to go from a loud part to a quiet part but the space they create 555 00:34:36,311 --> 00:34:41,498 and the tone that, that like creates a feeling of bigness throughout the record 556 00:34:41,998 --> 00:34:47,468 because a lot of it is not recorded in a big Led Zeppelin four kind of way. 557 00:34:48,028 --> 00:34:49,988 It's close mic'd, it's tight. 558 00:34:50,355 --> 00:34:52,085 You know, there's some DI stuff. 559 00:34:52,295 --> 00:34:53,825 Dave's vocals are very tight. 560 00:34:53,835 --> 00:34:55,565 The drums are very tight and dry. 561 00:34:56,045 --> 00:34:59,705 It sonically is not necessarily a record that I would think of as 562 00:34:59,705 --> 00:35:04,455 big, but there's just like such a torrent of shit coming at you. 563 00:35:05,005 --> 00:35:09,605 That the dynamic stuff helps you zoom out and it sort of 564 00:35:09,605 --> 00:35:10,855 creates space in the recording. 565 00:35:11,222 --> 00:35:12,262 Cliff: Yeah, a hundred percent. 566 00:35:12,292 --> 00:35:19,572 I, uh, I remember that surprising me, specific to the sound of it, back hearing 567 00:35:19,572 --> 00:35:25,169 it, even back then, for the first time, in, you know, probably, 48k on my iPod, 568 00:35:25,249 --> 00:35:28,849 or whatever, um, or probably, yeah, 569 00:35:29,204 --> 00:35:31,574 Kyle: It just, it sounded like a monophonic ringtone. 570 00:35:31,574 --> 00:35:31,954 Yeah. 571 00:35:31,984 --> 00:35:32,504 Cliff: Jesus. 572 00:35:32,684 --> 00:35:36,264 Yeah, so, actually, yeah, so, at that time, that would have been, I 573 00:35:36,264 --> 00:35:39,214 would have been downloading this on Napster, playing this on the old Family 574 00:35:39,214 --> 00:35:44,054 Computer Speaks, uh, with whatever, uh, headphone I could find nearby, and 575 00:35:44,124 --> 00:35:45,684 Kyle: crackle, needless to 576 00:35:45,694 --> 00:35:50,424 Cliff: yup, and even then, you'd be like, Well, this sounds like it was 577 00:35:50,424 --> 00:35:53,294 recorded in a toilet paper tube, uh, why? 578 00:35:54,384 --> 00:36:00,714 and I do want to call out like I Speaking for myself, I guess I I don't love the 579 00:36:00,724 --> 00:36:04,904 production of this record And I don't think that the reason that most people 580 00:36:04,904 --> 00:36:10,724 love this record is because of the production of it but It was a move, 581 00:36:11,014 --> 00:36:16,094 and I didn't realize that it was a move until, and we might mention this later, 582 00:36:16,094 --> 00:36:21,991 but Norma Jean, we, we covered that, you know, we did an episode on their first 583 00:36:22,131 --> 00:36:23,761 record, Bless the Martyr, Kiss the Child. 584 00:36:24,181 --> 00:36:28,211 If that sounded like an ISIS record, the next record they, they had, 585 00:36:28,211 --> 00:36:32,001 Oh God, the Aftermath, sounded exactly like a Botch record. 586 00:36:32,881 --> 00:36:37,011 And it freaked me out when I heard it the first time because I was kind of looking 587 00:36:37,011 --> 00:36:40,991 forward to that record And I didn't understand it and then it didn't take 588 00:36:41,001 --> 00:36:46,981 but even back then a pretty quick like Set of googles to quickly understand. 589 00:36:47,031 --> 00:36:48,731 Oh matt bales did. 590 00:36:48,991 --> 00:36:52,191 Oh, he Oh, this is him, in both places. 591 00:36:52,451 --> 00:36:53,531 Now I understand. 592 00:36:53,721 --> 00:36:56,211 This is a very particular way to do hardcore, and it 593 00:36:56,211 --> 00:36:57,941 sounds this way on purpose. 594 00:36:58,411 --> 00:37:02,351 And, so, I think, trying to avoid 595 00:37:02,571 --> 00:37:05,381 Kyle: but it's not like a whole, it's not, it's not like an 596 00:37:05,401 --> 00:37:07,591 injustice for all thing where you're 597 00:37:07,791 --> 00:37:08,911 Cliff: Yeah, yeah, yeah, exactly. 598 00:37:08,991 --> 00:37:09,901 Kyle: this sucks. 599 00:37:11,331 --> 00:37:12,371 do I love it? 600 00:37:12,641 --> 00:37:15,771 Like if I was in a heavy band, would I want my record to sound like that? 601 00:37:15,801 --> 00:37:16,301 No. 602 00:37:16,731 --> 00:37:17,821 Would I change it? 603 00:37:18,188 --> 00:37:19,168 Absolutely not. 604 00:37:19,318 --> 00:37:22,768 Like it, it adds to, it's the fifth man thing. 605 00:37:23,078 --> 00:37:24,448 It adds to it. 606 00:37:24,468 --> 00:37:28,778 And I think some of the bite of it would be lost. 607 00:37:29,283 --> 00:37:31,133 It sounds good. 608 00:37:31,500 --> 00:37:35,530 And I don't, I don't really know how to convey like like objectively, 609 00:37:35,530 --> 00:37:38,930 if you're a Nashville person, which Matt Bayless was, that's where he 610 00:37:38,930 --> 00:37:42,400 interned and he worked with country guys on straight to tape all day. 611 00:37:42,810 --> 00:37:43,870 So again, it was a move. 612 00:37:43,970 --> 00:37:44,860 He knew what he was doing. 613 00:37:44,870 --> 00:37:47,270 They knew what they were doing when they produced this record. 614 00:37:47,880 --> 00:37:49,260 is it objectively good? 615 00:37:49,270 --> 00:37:51,180 No, probably not. 616 00:37:51,330 --> 00:37:54,797 But, but it is, it is intentional. 617 00:37:54,807 --> 00:37:55,677 It is deliberate. 618 00:37:56,237 --> 00:37:56,937 And it is good. 619 00:37:56,957 --> 00:37:58,957 It is good in the way that it wants to be. 620 00:37:59,227 --> 00:38:01,747 It's not like there's nothing about it that you hear it and 621 00:38:01,747 --> 00:38:02,827 you're like, this sounds like shit. 622 00:38:03,337 --> 00:38:06,967 It's, it's dialed into what it is, but it's different. 623 00:38:07,528 --> 00:38:08,178 Cliff: to all that. 624 00:38:09,173 --> 00:38:14,703 It's important to point out though, because it has an outsized impact on 625 00:38:14,713 --> 00:38:17,663 how it sounds in certain contexts. 626 00:38:17,983 --> 00:38:21,953 This record changes the most to me, depending on what type of 627 00:38:21,963 --> 00:38:23,393 headphones you're listening to. 628 00:38:23,733 --> 00:38:27,913 Car, not bass subwoofer, not right. 629 00:38:27,913 --> 00:38:32,003 Like there's a, there's a very particular little alley that 630 00:38:32,003 --> 00:38:34,073 the bass guitar is driving down. 631 00:38:34,273 --> 00:38:36,763 And if your headphones are not good at that little. 632 00:38:36,968 --> 00:38:38,078 You just won't hear it. 633 00:38:38,618 --> 00:38:39,428 You just won't hear it. 634 00:38:39,778 --> 00:38:40,318 Kyle: I agree. 635 00:38:40,723 --> 00:38:40,943 Cliff: And. 636 00:38:41,643 --> 00:38:46,503 But, to your point, it begins to feel intentional if you'll let yourself hear 637 00:38:46,503 --> 00:38:53,733 it, because what does happen by doing that is guitar merges with vocals, and 638 00:38:53,733 --> 00:38:55,833 everything becomes an extreme downbeat. 639 00:38:56,898 --> 00:39:02,158 Push like everything has an energy to it when everything's kind of coming 640 00:39:02,168 --> 00:39:08,238 down at the same time that Disconnects a bit I think from the rhythm that's 641 00:39:08,238 --> 00:39:12,668 otherwise setting it up And that creates a really cool dynamic and 642 00:39:12,668 --> 00:39:16,863 it's part of what makes it really difficult to find doing rhythmically. 643 00:39:17,443 --> 00:39:19,843 And we'll probably talk about this some more as well. 644 00:39:19,843 --> 00:39:24,923 But like the alternations between what designates a downbeat in 645 00:39:24,923 --> 00:39:27,663 this music will send you spinning. 646 00:39:27,963 --> 00:39:33,168 And It's an aspect of what makes you feel off kilter and what makes it feel like 647 00:39:33,168 --> 00:39:37,608 it lacks like resolution and things like that it's all kind of working together 648 00:39:37,608 --> 00:39:41,788 and doing something interesting that a lot of other music never really tried 649 00:39:41,818 --> 00:39:47,268 to do and for me, especially Going back and trying to both remember what 650 00:39:47,268 --> 00:39:52,548 it felt like at the time and thinking about it now like it still Shocks me 651 00:39:52,558 --> 00:39:58,423 how little any of these songs resolve in a traditional musical sense Period. 652 00:39:58,893 --> 00:40:04,793 Root notes, choruses, payoffs in general, no, no. 653 00:40:05,303 --> 00:40:09,533 And it becomes even clearer that that's the case when you listen to 654 00:40:09,543 --> 00:40:13,683 bands who were heavily inspired by them and took more melodic directions 655 00:40:13,963 --> 00:40:17,463 and turned those into like resolving choruses and things like that. 656 00:40:17,873 --> 00:40:22,830 And so to me, this just like continues to kind of stand out as like, it's It 657 00:40:22,830 --> 00:40:27,190 was a unified approach to something in particular that is very, very 658 00:40:27,190 --> 00:40:31,670 hard to execute unless your brain is already kind of preconceptualizing it. 659 00:40:32,080 --> 00:40:37,530 But if you want to hear what I think first of all, to be even clearer, like 660 00:40:37,530 --> 00:40:41,070 there has already been a remaster of this record that came out, which is 661 00:40:41,130 --> 00:40:44,270 for the most part, the one you're going to listen to when you're streaming. 662 00:40:44,590 --> 00:40:48,770 And I think that got released in 2006 or 2007, something like that, maybe. 663 00:40:49,240 --> 00:40:56,990 And yeah 2007 and so that's already improving for sure but then The two 664 00:40:56,990 --> 00:41:01,015 minutes to late night guys did a cover of to our friends in the great white 665 00:41:01,015 --> 00:41:06,545 north and curbaloo's playing guitar on it and Presumably had something to do 666 00:41:06,555 --> 00:41:10,235 with maybe the production or how some of that sounds and I thought it gave an 667 00:41:10,275 --> 00:41:16,782 interesting um insight into how would a whole bunch of people who definitely 668 00:41:16,782 --> 00:41:21,669 respect what was being done on this record treat the first song from this record? 669 00:41:21,679 --> 00:41:26,839 Like the most recognizable sound in some hardcore sub genres at all 670 00:41:27,139 --> 00:41:28,609 is the beginning of this record. 671 00:41:29,349 --> 00:41:33,119 And so it was an interesting bit to listen to there, but to your point, like 672 00:41:33,129 --> 00:41:37,160 you can even see that Even though I feel like I can tell some tonal differences, 673 00:41:37,160 --> 00:41:41,760 especially maybe in drums and things like that, they are still trying to achieve 674 00:41:41,770 --> 00:41:46,870 that same unified sharpness that would come down with angular guitar riffs and 675 00:41:46,870 --> 00:41:48,540 vocals happening all at the same time. 676 00:41:48,858 --> 00:41:51,688 So it's a fun thing to experiment with and think about. 677 00:41:54,218 --> 00:41:57,588 So that, that continues to catch me off guard a little bit these days 678 00:41:57,688 --> 00:41:59,888 as I think about and listen to it. 679 00:42:00,134 --> 00:42:05,884 But being less of a fucking dork for a second, uh, you know, we, uh, we talk 680 00:42:05,894 --> 00:42:10,194 a lot about the, uh, everything's in four, four, if you're not a huge dork 681 00:42:10,494 --> 00:42:17,834 challenge I want you to kind of apply it here, especially if you are someone 682 00:42:17,834 --> 00:42:20,844 who's new to this record or doesn't listen to a lot of music like this, 683 00:42:21,144 --> 00:42:24,564 if you have trouble, like latching in. 684 00:42:25,204 --> 00:42:29,774 Just go straight to transitions from persona to object in the very beginning. 685 00:42:30,141 --> 00:42:34,646 It is five beats over four beats And then every 20 beats, 686 00:42:35,116 --> 00:42:36,806 these two things come together. 687 00:42:37,156 --> 00:42:41,506 If you'll just kind of sit with that part of that song for a second and try 688 00:42:41,506 --> 00:42:46,653 to count out those notes and hear it, maybe, not for everybody, but maybe, 689 00:42:46,773 --> 00:42:48,613 some people it will like, click in. 690 00:42:48,843 --> 00:42:52,543 You'll find out there's like a codex to this thing in a lot of 691 00:42:52,543 --> 00:42:57,773 the cases that makes you, like, it's what makes the hook worth it. 692 00:42:58,213 --> 00:43:03,243 In a lot of these records is because once you get where that downbeat is you hear 693 00:43:03,243 --> 00:43:05,663 it differently And then you're locked in 694 00:43:06,030 --> 00:43:11,672 Kyle: I have listened to this record and thought, How would I be able to keep up 695 00:43:11,672 --> 00:43:14,092 with the changes if I were in this band? 696 00:43:14,512 --> 00:43:15,712 And they're definitely one of those. 697 00:43:15,712 --> 00:43:19,602 Well, I would just have to memorize parts until they became muscle memory. 698 00:43:20,222 --> 00:43:24,642 Because to your point, I do think a little bit of it is inherent to them and the 699 00:43:24,642 --> 00:43:28,342 different influences that they brought to the room and like some of the weird 700 00:43:28,709 --> 00:43:31,479 tensions in, in lots of different ways. 701 00:43:32,079 --> 00:43:36,503 It's definitely not Polyphia or one of those bands where it's like the math is 702 00:43:36,513 --> 00:43:41,323 the point and it's like it's this and then it's this and I went to berkeley and 703 00:43:41,388 --> 00:43:43,948 Cliff: Yeah with very clean playing and everything. 704 00:43:44,033 --> 00:43:44,943 Kyle: Yeah, yeah. 705 00:43:44,943 --> 00:43:50,450 Yeah, it's just uh a little off, you know, I'm going to take, I'm going 706 00:43:50,450 --> 00:43:55,780 to take this thing that's regular and then I'll, I'll take out one little 707 00:43:55,790 --> 00:44:00,520 chunk here and I'll stick it underneath over here on this other side until it 708 00:44:00,530 --> 00:44:05,335 starts looking kind of funky, but it definitely starts from a like, just what's 709 00:44:05,335 --> 00:44:07,625 a cool basic idea type of framework, 710 00:44:07,992 --> 00:44:11,852 Cliff: Yeah, there's a, I'm not one for these videos normally, but there 711 00:44:11,852 --> 00:44:17,872 is a cool reaction video on YouTube of someone who's clearly like very 712 00:44:17,872 --> 00:44:23,412 well versed in music theory and is a composer reacting to is it C. 713 00:44:23,412 --> 00:44:24,182 Thomas Howell? 714 00:44:24,402 --> 00:44:29,682 It was one of, one of the songs from this record and he is, no, I think it was 715 00:44:29,682 --> 00:44:31,522 transitions for persona to object, but 716 00:44:31,522 --> 00:44:35,092 Kyle: which, which, by the way, multiple interviews, different band members 717 00:44:35,092 --> 00:44:39,172 have said, like, I think that's the high watermark of the Botch sound. 718 00:44:39,812 --> 00:44:46,662 So if you start with to our friends and that's too much, like 719 00:44:46,692 --> 00:44:50,162 skip straight to track three, that's my favorite Botch song. 720 00:44:50,792 --> 00:44:53,012 Cliff, obviously you have an affinity for it. 721 00:44:53,532 --> 00:44:56,602 They played it pretty late in the set in the reunion tour. 722 00:44:57,002 --> 00:44:59,252 And it got quite a reaction. 723 00:44:59,862 --> 00:45:02,252 So there, there is something there. 724 00:45:02,362 --> 00:45:05,662 It's, there's like a core Botch thing, which is interesting because 725 00:45:05,662 --> 00:45:07,692 it's one of their weirder songs. 726 00:45:08,432 --> 00:45:09,862 It's not like a Botch fastball. 727 00:45:09,872 --> 00:45:10,892 It's a Botch change up. 728 00:45:10,892 --> 00:45:14,849 Ha ha 729 00:45:15,482 --> 00:45:18,992 Cliff: this reaction video is funny because it ends up being, 730 00:45:19,822 --> 00:45:21,222 um, and we know how this feels. 731 00:45:21,372 --> 00:45:24,432 This guy says pretty late in the video, holy shit, this song was 732 00:45:24,432 --> 00:45:27,162 like a seven minute song and I've talked for 45 minutes about it. 733 00:45:27,172 --> 00:45:28,082 How did that happen? 734 00:45:28,352 --> 00:45:30,092 Like, yeah, I feel you. 735 00:45:32,926 --> 00:45:36,256 Let's get another white guy in here and we'll add another hour to every episode. 736 00:45:36,316 --> 00:45:36,956 It'll be sick. 737 00:45:39,766 --> 00:45:40,836 Kyle: Director's cut. 738 00:45:44,761 --> 00:45:44,931 Cliff: the 739 00:45:45,006 --> 00:45:49,626 Kyle: I put three white guys in a room and all I got was this shitty DVD commentary. 740 00:45:52,146 --> 00:45:54,686 Cliff: just a lot of, wow, that's so interesting, yeah, 741 00:45:55,158 --> 00:45:55,628 Kyle: Dude. 742 00:45:55,668 --> 00:45:56,098 Bro. 743 00:45:56,478 --> 00:45:56,978 Bro. 744 00:45:57,738 --> 00:45:58,178 Wait. 745 00:45:58,268 --> 00:45:58,628 Bro. 746 00:45:58,638 --> 00:45:59,128 Wait. 747 00:45:59,258 --> 00:45:59,708 Babe. 748 00:46:00,458 --> 00:46:05,358 Cliff: listen to this guy who's clearly smart about music, like try 749 00:46:05,358 --> 00:46:10,178 to kind of chronologically track in real time, the time signatures. 750 00:46:10,298 --> 00:46:12,988 He's clearly very good at it and he does it right at the beginning, 751 00:46:13,258 --> 00:46:16,708 right in that part I'm talking about where it's like a 5 4 over 4 4. 752 00:46:16,908 --> 00:46:18,238 And he's, he's easily doing it. 753 00:46:18,238 --> 00:46:20,268 And then as it goes along, he's like, no, I got it. 754 00:46:20,408 --> 00:46:22,848 And he's naming them and he's counting them out and he's naming them. 755 00:46:23,108 --> 00:46:25,558 And then it starts to get to several places and he's like, 756 00:46:26,118 --> 00:46:27,088 I don't know what they did. 757 00:46:27,613 --> 00:46:28,143 I don't know. 758 00:46:28,493 --> 00:46:29,043 I don't know. 759 00:46:29,463 --> 00:46:33,243 And it, but he kept, it was this cycle, which I think is a cycle 760 00:46:33,243 --> 00:46:36,513 that's worth having for people maybe listening to this for the first 761 00:46:36,513 --> 00:46:40,583 time, which is like, that didn't make any sense, but it wasn't wrong. 762 00:46:41,123 --> 00:46:42,893 That didn't make any sense, but it wasn't wrong. 763 00:46:43,263 --> 00:46:43,793 Hold on. 764 00:46:43,843 --> 00:46:44,323 Okay. 765 00:46:44,523 --> 00:46:44,883 That did. 766 00:46:44,943 --> 00:46:45,333 Okay. 767 00:46:45,383 --> 00:46:46,673 I don't understand what happened. 768 00:46:46,683 --> 00:46:51,543 It feels random, but at the same time, it works if I keep in here and listen to the 769 00:46:51,553 --> 00:46:53,243 next thing that it's connecting to you. 770 00:46:53,610 --> 00:46:58,640 Kyle: For other non musician fans of that Michael Palomino guy, 771 00:46:58,710 --> 00:47:01,730 the guy who always plays the PRS guitar and reacts to different 772 00:47:02,097 --> 00:47:02,497 Pieces of 773 00:47:02,527 --> 00:47:02,697 Cliff: yeah. 774 00:47:03,347 --> 00:47:04,407 That guy seems so sweet. 775 00:47:04,587 --> 00:47:05,697 Kyle: It's a, I agree. 776 00:47:05,757 --> 00:47:07,157 Like, I love watching his videos. 777 00:47:07,524 --> 00:47:12,874 Watching that guy when you sent me that was a lot like the satisfaction 778 00:47:13,024 --> 00:47:17,104 of watching a Michael Palomino video where he can't immediately 779 00:47:17,104 --> 00:47:19,384 find the phrasing of a thing. 780 00:47:19,994 --> 00:47:23,844 It's satisfying if you like the piece of music and he can't 781 00:47:23,844 --> 00:47:24,914 figure it out immediately. 782 00:47:24,914 --> 00:47:26,424 Cause it's like, there's a smartness to it. 783 00:47:26,514 --> 00:47:29,204 If he can't, if this guy with perfect pitch and whatever, 784 00:47:29,204 --> 00:47:30,554 can't get right to the thing. 785 00:47:31,014 --> 00:47:35,894 So it was cool to watch that guy with bots where he was like, it's so weird. 786 00:47:36,424 --> 00:47:37,344 And so we're like, what? 787 00:47:38,934 --> 00:47:39,314 Yeah, 788 00:47:39,404 --> 00:47:40,314 it's gratifying. 789 00:47:40,681 --> 00:47:43,591 You know, there's something there, but structurally, you 790 00:47:43,591 --> 00:47:44,911 don't necessarily know what it is. 791 00:47:45,278 --> 00:47:48,315 Cliff: yeah And so let's dig in a little bit more there because there's still, 792 00:47:48,615 --> 00:47:53,396 there's intentionality and there's some cool, I think more, more than almost 793 00:47:53,396 --> 00:47:54,876 any other records we've talked about. 794 00:47:55,416 --> 00:48:01,236 This one has nice little vignette quotes that'll help kind of box you in to like 795 00:48:01,236 --> 00:48:04,366 we said, it's always going to alternate between overthinking and underthinking. 796 00:48:05,011 --> 00:48:07,931 So bringing out little vignettes about what they were actually trying to 797 00:48:07,931 --> 00:48:14,411 do versus the meaning that you could project onto it in reverse is hilarious. 798 00:48:14,691 --> 00:48:16,801 As a spoiler, soon we will talk about C. 799 00:48:16,801 --> 00:48:23,086 Thomas Howell as the soul man, the title of the song, and how How hilarious it 800 00:48:23,086 --> 00:48:27,316 is that that is the song title, and how it is not as serious as you think it is 801 00:48:27,316 --> 00:48:29,516 once you figure out why it's hilarious. 802 00:48:29,746 --> 00:48:30,676 It's all amazing. 803 00:48:31,136 --> 00:48:37,856 But, one quote that's great was, The point of Botch was as Tim 804 00:48:37,896 --> 00:48:41,446 always put it, apparently Keep it in a weird time signature so when 805 00:48:41,446 --> 00:48:43,646 they're banging their heads, they're banging them on the wrong beat. 806 00:48:44,013 --> 00:48:49,388 And it's like a Okay, that can actually help me kind of figure this out. 807 00:48:49,698 --> 00:48:52,998 And you would see then from all the bands that these folks would go on to 808 00:48:52,998 --> 00:48:56,328 make, because this was actually their last studio record because apparently 809 00:48:56,328 --> 00:48:57,948 they didn't get along super well. 810 00:48:58,362 --> 00:49:02,382 But like, they would go on to, you got Minus the Bear and Russian Circles and 811 00:49:02,392 --> 00:49:07,232 These Arms are Snakes, uh, and Roy, which is a, a definite fun offshoot 812 00:49:07,572 --> 00:49:11,642 but like, they would always continue to play with weird time signatures 813 00:49:11,652 --> 00:49:14,932 in a lot of those other bands, but specifically within Botch, like, it was 814 00:49:14,932 --> 00:49:21,042 very antagonistic intentionally from the perspective of, of the actual rhythm. 815 00:49:21,522 --> 00:49:23,542 And then the guitarists were. 816 00:49:24,082 --> 00:49:28,882 I found reading about it fascinating, especially reading it now and hearing 817 00:49:28,882 --> 00:49:33,362 it from grown adults thinking about how they played guitar, 20 years ago or 25 818 00:49:33,362 --> 00:49:38,162 years ago, and hearing them basically talk about, like, the thought that they 819 00:49:38,162 --> 00:49:42,402 put into it was, Well, we want it to be more complex than our last record 820 00:49:42,522 --> 00:49:45,642 because we were kind of just fucking around with one finger drop detuning 821 00:49:45,682 --> 00:49:50,442 chord things then So we wanted it to be more complicated than that But at the 822 00:49:50,442 --> 00:49:55,542 same time anything kind of beyond that no like they weren't thinking harder. 823 00:49:55,572 --> 00:50:00,067 It was more just like I want to play it differently than I played it last time 824 00:50:00,307 --> 00:50:04,607 and I need it to be weird and mash up with all the weird stuff that we're doing, uh, 825 00:50:04,607 --> 00:50:08,177 so that it's like, you know, sharp and angular and that's going to sound right. 826 00:50:08,536 --> 00:50:09,936 There's no grand scheme. 827 00:50:10,196 --> 00:50:15,236 Uh, there's no like magical complex music theory approach to how the 828 00:50:15,236 --> 00:50:19,716 stuff was written which I think makes it all the more fascinating 829 00:50:19,716 --> 00:50:21,466 that it came out this way at all. 830 00:50:23,331 --> 00:50:26,631 Kyle: And then you add in the layer of you know, they said it was kind of a fluke. 831 00:50:26,781 --> 00:50:28,871 They, this band was slow at writing. 832 00:50:29,271 --> 00:50:32,971 America Nervoso took a long time to put together. 833 00:50:32,981 --> 00:50:36,611 Some of the songs were five and six years old by the time that record came out. 834 00:50:37,191 --> 00:50:42,891 So they did a big tour on nso then it was what's our next tour going to be? 835 00:50:42,921 --> 00:50:46,761 That gave them sort of an end point for, okay, well we need new 836 00:50:46,761 --> 00:50:49,348 music for when we go on that tour. 837 00:50:49,988 --> 00:50:55,718 And they booked some studio time and just so happened, I don't know, 838 00:50:55,718 --> 00:50:59,888 cos call it cosmic whatever, to have a really fruitful writing phase. 839 00:51:00,488 --> 00:51:02,468 NSO took two years to write. 840 00:51:02,978 --> 00:51:07,937 And then Romans came out in less than six months The thing that I love 841 00:51:08,017 --> 00:51:13,567 that they said about it just as a self professed creative, they said 842 00:51:13,567 --> 00:51:15,317 it was a flurry of creative activity. 843 00:51:15,667 --> 00:51:17,797 And it was almost like one of those things where once we'd given 844 00:51:17,797 --> 00:51:21,347 ourselves a few parameters, once we'd established that we were not going 845 00:51:21,347 --> 00:51:25,197 to do standard palm muted mosh parts, just cutting that completely out. 846 00:51:25,527 --> 00:51:27,027 So then it's, what can we do? 847 00:51:27,037 --> 00:51:28,607 That's way more satisfying than that. 848 00:51:29,027 --> 00:51:32,547 So by creating boundaries and limitations, it opened things up for us. 849 00:51:32,907 --> 00:51:35,557 Made us think a little more aggressively and thinking outside the 850 00:51:35,557 --> 00:51:37,427 box made things a lot more exciting. 851 00:51:37,787 --> 00:51:41,767 Doing things like looping guitar parts and transitions from persona to object. 852 00:51:42,107 --> 00:51:44,317 We were by no means the first band to come up with that. 853 00:51:44,357 --> 00:51:48,347 You can listen to Self Pity by No Means No from 1981 and they do a 854 00:51:48,347 --> 00:51:49,767 very similar thing in that song. 855 00:51:50,157 --> 00:51:52,407 But for us, that kind of musical technique was uncharted 856 00:51:52,407 --> 00:51:54,247 territory and super exciting. 857 00:51:54,667 --> 00:52:01,112 I love One of my favorite creative exercises is more constraints, like even 858 00:52:01,112 --> 00:52:06,872 within the context of this podcast, going from what do you want to talk about into, 859 00:52:07,542 --> 00:52:13,642 context, what to do on first listen, uh, what to think about influence, just, Just 860 00:52:13,642 --> 00:52:17,822 like three, three or four really specific things has been really liberating too. 861 00:52:17,822 --> 00:52:23,279 So like any, anybody who's looking to try to do anything new impose a limitation. 862 00:52:23,389 --> 00:52:25,049 What can I do in 24 hours? 863 00:52:25,059 --> 00:52:28,428 That's why I love, I've mentioned it before the Brian Eno card deck. 864 00:52:28,714 --> 00:52:29,184 Oblique 865 00:52:29,184 --> 00:52:30,124 strategies. 866 00:52:30,204 --> 00:52:31,224 Yeah, yeah, yeah. 867 00:52:31,324 --> 00:52:35,174 That's why I love it so much imposing a limitation or a dimension or whatever. 868 00:52:35,714 --> 00:52:41,079 Just like, push the physics of your imagination, of your 869 00:52:41,079 --> 00:52:42,969 creative being, in a direction. 870 00:52:43,629 --> 00:52:45,079 And they were definitely doing that here. 871 00:52:47,384 --> 00:52:51,584 Cliff: And I think maybe another thing that you specifically and personally 872 00:52:51,594 --> 00:52:57,144 would probably align with that supports that same creative energy is when you 873 00:52:57,144 --> 00:53:01,454 find a thing though that really captures whatever part of you that's like, um, 874 00:53:01,809 --> 00:53:06,339 This fucking sucks, and I hate it, and I want to make it better, and I'm going to 875 00:53:06,339 --> 00:53:08,439 keep pointing at it until it gets better. 876 00:53:08,909 --> 00:53:14,113 That also motivated aspects of what they did, specifically with like, we 877 00:53:14,113 --> 00:53:19,000 mentioned they were sort of immediately antagonistic towards and from the scene 878 00:53:19,060 --> 00:53:21,140 itself that they were maybe attached to. 879 00:53:21,580 --> 00:53:25,950 But they also had a really, they were really hot on this thing back then, 880 00:53:26,140 --> 00:53:29,887 and then they still talk about it now, where One of the things they were 881 00:53:29,887 --> 00:53:36,415 respec Repelling so strongly against That punk had And, and Hardcore had 882 00:53:36,565 --> 00:53:42,105 tried to become self serious in a way that made them really uncomfortable. 883 00:53:42,615 --> 00:53:47,875 And they have, I mean, they're, they're on record in a number of places, and I 884 00:53:47,875 --> 00:53:50,935 don't just mean musically, they're on record in interviews basically being 885 00:53:50,935 --> 00:53:55,485 like, we hate the band Race Trader and everyone else who's like them, who was 886 00:53:55,525 --> 00:53:59,015 at that time, like a band who you like. 887 00:53:59,235 --> 00:54:03,545 It's pretty easy to go back and, and find the edges that Botcha's pointing 888 00:54:03,545 --> 00:54:05,675 at and saying that's stupid now. 889 00:54:06,045 --> 00:54:12,165 But like, you could also see and empathize how bands and movements like 890 00:54:12,165 --> 00:54:16,995 that emerge from punk and hardcore scenes where people People care 891 00:54:17,055 --> 00:54:19,065 people care about a lot of stuff. 892 00:54:19,345 --> 00:54:24,785 That's we talk endlessly about people who are kind of outside of that 893 00:54:24,785 --> 00:54:27,985 scene or who have never come into it for a moment just to look around. 894 00:54:28,285 --> 00:54:31,272 It comes across as some sort of like, aggressive. 895 00:54:31,522 --> 00:54:36,082 Nihilistic anti community thing when really the only thing that's right about 896 00:54:36,082 --> 00:54:39,272 that is it's nihilistic But in a way where we take care of each other and we 897 00:54:39,272 --> 00:54:43,662 care about things really deeply and we yell about them Until they go away or 898 00:54:43,662 --> 00:54:50,669 we keep yelling and like so Seeing bands respond so early and so harshly to the 899 00:54:50,669 --> 00:54:55,129 idea that you needed to become very very serious if you're going to become a punk 900 00:54:55,129 --> 00:55:00,756 or a hardcore aficionado who cared about politics and things like that was Part 901 00:55:00,756 --> 00:55:06,786 of what played into, not only their whole vibe, but really specifically, songs here, 902 00:55:07,046 --> 00:55:13,166 including the song See Thomas Howell as the Soul Man, which basically has lyrics, 903 00:55:13,186 --> 00:55:17,376 which, maybe we can talk about this if we need to on this episode, but, even when 904 00:55:17,376 --> 00:55:24,146 you talk to the vocalist about the lyrics he wrote, he's not super like, these are 905 00:55:24,146 --> 00:55:26,166 important, and I thought a lot about them. 906 00:55:27,111 --> 00:55:29,401 It's pretty much nope, I wrote them at the last minute. 907 00:55:29,411 --> 00:55:30,911 I'm a terrible procrastinator. 908 00:55:31,281 --> 00:55:35,791 And, they themselves would go on to inspire decades of vocalists who 909 00:55:35,791 --> 00:55:41,041 then would just say vague, obtuse phrases, uh, over and over on top 910 00:55:41,061 --> 00:55:43,431 of riffs and it became vocaling. 911 00:55:43,741 --> 00:55:49,761 But here in this song, part of the vocals were basically piping in this message 912 00:55:49,771 --> 00:55:53,491 where they painted really specific other bands in portions of the scene. 913 00:55:53,991 --> 00:55:57,721 But an extremely Botch vignette of this whole thing, right? 914 00:55:57,911 --> 00:55:58,151 C. 915 00:55:58,151 --> 00:56:01,061 Thomas Howell was a person, a human being. 916 00:56:01,111 --> 00:56:01,721 Is a person? 917 00:56:02,001 --> 00:56:03,281 I'm not actually sure at this moment. 918 00:56:03,411 --> 00:56:03,951 Kyle: He's still very 919 00:56:04,011 --> 00:56:04,321 Cliff: actor. 920 00:56:05,061 --> 00:56:05,821 Okay, great. 921 00:56:06,861 --> 00:56:07,921 You never know anymore, right? 922 00:56:08,311 --> 00:56:09,401 This person was an actor. 923 00:56:10,031 --> 00:56:12,471 He acted in the movie Soulman. 924 00:56:13,041 --> 00:56:17,791 In the movie Soulman, he portrays a character who, and I'm gonna mega 925 00:56:17,791 --> 00:56:22,541 shorten this, he plays a character who wears blackface to get ahead in society. 926 00:56:22,541 --> 00:56:29,931 And so, so if you stop in this moment and you take that information and you 927 00:56:29,931 --> 00:56:32,101 go, well, that's quite a statement. 928 00:56:32,691 --> 00:56:33,031 Right? 929 00:56:33,221 --> 00:56:34,611 Look at what they named that song. 930 00:56:35,001 --> 00:56:35,301 What? 931 00:56:35,381 --> 00:56:35,891 Okay. 932 00:56:36,071 --> 00:56:40,501 So they're pointing at specific bands saying don't put on an act 933 00:56:40,511 --> 00:56:44,131 of self seriousness in order to elevate yourself above other people 934 00:56:44,261 --> 00:56:47,521 because all you're really doing is reinforcing the systems of oppression 935 00:56:47,681 --> 00:56:49,261 that you're trying to rebel against. 936 00:56:49,628 --> 00:56:53,328 And you can write this whole story about how genius it is that they ended 937 00:56:53,328 --> 00:56:58,148 up, titling the song like this and how it highlights something so maybe 938 00:56:58,158 --> 00:57:00,368 insightful about their perspective. 939 00:57:00,678 --> 00:57:05,538 When actually they ended up naming it that because there were tapping 940 00:57:05,538 --> 00:57:08,108 parts on the guitar in the song. 941 00:57:08,528 --> 00:57:11,338 So they started calling it Taps, and they thought C. 942 00:57:11,338 --> 00:57:13,288 Thomas Howell was in the movie Taps. 943 00:57:13,668 --> 00:57:15,158 So they started calling the song C. 944 00:57:15,158 --> 00:57:18,748 Thomas Howell, but then they realized he wasn't in TAPS, but he was in 945 00:57:18,748 --> 00:57:21,868 Soulman, so the title of the song is C. 946 00:57:21,868 --> 00:57:22,988 Thomas Howell as the Soulman. 947 00:57:27,858 --> 00:57:31,685 Kyle: There's so many moments that remind me of Donald Glover's Wu 948 00:57:31,685 --> 00:57:35,775 Tang name generator moment where like everybody was messing around 949 00:57:35,775 --> 00:57:39,755 with it and then Childish Gambino came out for and he was like, wait. 950 00:57:40,470 --> 00:57:42,460 I have to be a rapper now because of this 951 00:57:43,325 --> 00:57:43,675 Cliff: Yep, 952 00:57:43,850 --> 00:57:44,970 Kyle: weird party trick. 953 00:57:46,930 --> 00:57:49,600 I mean, the name of the album kind of came from an it's not 954 00:57:49,600 --> 00:57:51,460 serious till it is thing, right? 955 00:57:51,480 --> 00:57:55,480 They said we had the song, man, the ramparts, which is the great 956 00:57:55,530 --> 00:57:57,650 closing track on the record. 957 00:57:57,990 --> 00:57:59,430 And I had just written the line. 958 00:57:59,440 --> 00:58:00,380 We are the Romans. 959 00:58:00,380 --> 00:58:03,340 Dave Rowland said Brian thought it'd make a great title. 960 00:58:03,630 --> 00:58:07,410 And Brian determined many of the song titles crediting JG 961 00:58:07,410 --> 00:58:08,900 Ballard's atrocity exhibition. 962 00:58:09,340 --> 00:58:09,680 Great. 963 00:58:10,115 --> 00:58:11,405 Danny Brown album title. 964 00:58:11,405 --> 00:58:13,755 Shout out JG Ballard for years of inspiration. 965 00:58:14,285 --> 00:58:18,895 Um, the atrocity exhibition as inspiring themes of the human body as 966 00:58:18,895 --> 00:58:21,825 a landscape and the way that culture and entertainment sort of dictates 967 00:58:21,835 --> 00:58:23,335 the human body and vice versa. 968 00:58:23,355 --> 00:58:26,015 So Brian cook very much a cerebral core of the band. 969 00:58:26,655 --> 00:58:31,197 Um, we'll, I'll talk a little more about him later anyway, on man, the ramparts. 970 00:58:31,467 --> 00:58:34,877 The line, we are the Romans Brian thought would make a great title, but Dave 971 00:58:34,877 --> 00:58:39,477 thought it was a totally silly gladiator song because the riff is kind of huge. 972 00:58:39,477 --> 00:58:42,427 So he was thinking about chariots and fire and stuff like that. 973 00:58:42,427 --> 00:58:46,807 And it sounded like I pulled the words out of Conan, the barbarian, but then. 974 00:58:47,492 --> 00:58:50,272 We in the band started talking about the social decline of Western 975 00:58:50,272 --> 00:58:54,092 civilization and how Americans are the new Romans, it's all slaves and Caesars. 976 00:58:54,122 --> 00:58:55,162 So we made it work. 977 00:58:55,742 --> 00:58:58,372 And then Brian said, I don't think Dave was originally trying 978 00:58:58,372 --> 00:58:59,662 to make some grandiose statement. 979 00:58:59,662 --> 00:59:02,202 I think he was just singing about Romans and using all of 980 00:59:02,202 --> 00:59:03,492 this cheesy medieval imagery. 981 00:59:03,962 --> 00:59:06,622 At the time, it seemed like sort of a joke, but when we went into the studio 982 00:59:06,622 --> 00:59:09,782 and actually finalized everything, it actually kind of worked as a metaphor 983 00:59:09,782 --> 00:59:11,972 for America as an empire and decline. 984 00:59:12,352 --> 00:59:15,952 So if you're looking around the scene and you see all these self serious shitheads, 985 00:59:16,487 --> 00:59:19,957 And you look at the larger world, and Nookie's playing every 30 minutes. 986 00:59:20,427 --> 00:59:24,527 And, everybody's falling for the saxophone playing dipshit in the 987 00:59:24,527 --> 00:59:26,217 White House who's doing war crimes. 988 00:59:26,717 --> 00:59:28,367 Uh, and criminalizing poverty. 989 00:59:28,647 --> 00:59:32,107 Then, of course, a little bit, you're gonna, you're gonna be like, I don't care! 990 00:59:32,337 --> 00:59:34,687 Unbuckle me from that rollercoaster! 991 00:59:35,117 --> 00:59:37,277 Until you lock into something really interesting, and then 992 00:59:37,277 --> 00:59:38,137 you're like, Oh, no, wait. 993 00:59:38,822 --> 00:59:39,992 Hold on, actually, 994 00:59:40,890 --> 00:59:45,850 Cliff: and apparently for practically every song title on this record, it was 995 00:59:47,300 --> 00:59:51,102 pretty much seemingly just Brian Cook. 996 00:59:52,057 --> 00:59:52,427 Coming 997 00:59:52,522 --> 00:59:55,572 Kyle: I don't, I don't think, I think Dave said I, I didn't come up with any of 998 00:59:55,572 --> 01:00:01,822 those and that's why so few of the lyrics have a connection to the song titles, 999 01:00:02,277 --> 01:00:02,517 Cliff: Yep, 1000 01:00:02,832 --> 01:00:07,622 Kyle: which, which became a cliche in heavy music later as well. 1001 01:00:08,262 --> 01:00:08,852 Um, 1002 01:00:09,057 --> 01:00:09,847 Cliff: about to say, yeah, 1003 01:00:09,892 --> 01:00:12,602 Kyle: yeah, more, more farcical titles and yeah, yeah. 1004 01:00:12,839 --> 01:00:16,289 Cliff: Well, yeah, and especially the super long ones that basically 1005 01:00:16,299 --> 01:00:19,739 had no correlation with anything that was actually being said in 1006 01:00:19,739 --> 01:00:22,839 the song, so that everything on the track listing looked ridiculous. 1007 01:00:23,144 --> 01:00:24,154 Kyle: Everything is alive. 1008 01:00:24,154 --> 01:00:25,144 Everything is breathing. 1009 01:00:25,144 --> 01:00:25,864 Nothing is dead. 1010 01:00:25,874 --> 01:00:26,919 Nothing is bleeding. 1011 01:00:29,453 --> 01:00:30,413 Cliff: So did this end. 1012 01:00:30,704 --> 01:00:36,574 We often also talk about if you can give yourself over to a thing enough 1013 01:00:36,574 --> 01:00:39,694 to let it get in your bones a little bit as you're listening to music and 1014 01:00:39,694 --> 01:00:42,514 letting it expand you on the inside. 1015 01:00:42,881 --> 01:00:47,361 What can you then focus on when you try to listen to this music really actively? 1016 01:00:47,971 --> 01:00:51,611 And how can you start to interpret it? 1017 01:00:51,621 --> 01:00:52,391 Think about it? 1018 01:00:52,981 --> 01:00:56,531 Uh, experience it in new or interesting ways. 1019 01:00:57,141 --> 01:01:03,685 I, I found, I, I kind of felt self conscious about saying this statement. 1020 01:01:03,725 --> 01:01:09,035 And then I listened to an offhanded other podcast episode where two people in 1021 01:01:09,035 --> 01:01:10,815 Australia were talking about this record. 1022 01:01:11,465 --> 01:01:16,335 And this, uh, the, the woman who was being interviewed, um, Had listened 1023 01:01:16,365 --> 01:01:20,275 to this record a lot after not really being exposed to it and was sort of 1024 01:01:20,325 --> 01:01:23,755 talking about her experience with it Very interesting premise for our 1025 01:01:23,785 --> 01:01:27,755 podcast Um having comedians listen to seminal hardcore records and then be 1026 01:01:27,755 --> 01:01:29,005 like, what did you think about that? 1027 01:01:29,015 --> 01:01:31,285 Be funny Was really fun. 1028 01:01:31,615 --> 01:01:32,905 But she was basically 1029 01:01:33,035 --> 01:01:34,175 Kyle: Hello, Line Cook! 1030 01:01:34,225 --> 01:01:35,915 Let's talk about the stock market! 1031 01:01:36,848 --> 01:01:41,198 Cliff: But she was like, you know, I ended up enjoying this most laying down 1032 01:01:41,668 --> 01:01:47,268 flat doing nothing else just listening She's like every time I try to put it on 1033 01:01:47,268 --> 01:01:51,898 doing something else It fell off and I couldn't get it and I couldn't lock in 1034 01:01:51,908 --> 01:01:55,528 and I couldn't appreciate anything about it She was like, you know, this is not my 1035 01:01:55,528 --> 01:01:59,738 normal type of music at all But I came to appreciate it But it didn't click in until 1036 01:01:59,738 --> 01:02:03,998 I decided to just lay down and listen to it without doing anything else at the 1037 01:02:03,998 --> 01:02:10,742 same time And I think There's something unique that I have no good explanation for 1038 01:02:10,942 --> 01:02:13,082 about this record and in some other ones. 1039 01:02:13,112 --> 01:02:16,862 In fact, actually the Chariot record you just mentioned is like this for me. 1040 01:02:17,412 --> 01:02:23,292 They cross some sort of threshold where they go from becoming a super energizing 1041 01:02:23,292 --> 01:02:30,802 thing to me, to becoming more of a like relaxed locked in thing and I tend to 1042 01:02:30,872 --> 01:02:38,612 I really enjoy this record doing much calmer things than I normally would 1043 01:02:38,952 --> 01:02:41,522 integrate this type of music into. 1044 01:02:41,812 --> 01:02:45,732 And I, I don't know why, but something about it feels different. 1045 01:02:46,062 --> 01:02:49,822 Uh, and I wanted to at least say it out loud so that if someone else had a 1046 01:02:49,822 --> 01:02:52,802 similar experience, you could try it too. 1047 01:02:52,842 --> 01:02:56,982 Cause like, doesn't feel like a put this on and chill at the pool type record. 1048 01:02:57,232 --> 01:03:00,102 And yet I have a feeling that would work pretty well. 1049 01:03:00,812 --> 01:03:01,692 And I don't know why. 1050 01:03:01,952 --> 01:03:06,462 Kyle: I don't want to ascribe too much of their intent to why that works. 1051 01:03:06,912 --> 01:03:08,102 But I had the same thought. 1052 01:03:08,232 --> 01:03:11,422 I was walking in my neighborhood, listening to this record, and I was 1053 01:03:11,422 --> 01:03:18,069 like, I love Like looking at the birds in the trees and smelling the fresh 1054 01:03:18,069 --> 01:03:24,079 cut grass to this record, it like it gives me a piece in a weird way. 1055 01:03:24,459 --> 01:03:30,114 I think it's I also don't like it for things like going for a run, or trying 1056 01:03:30,114 --> 01:03:35,594 to exercise, or like getting pumped up, or anything like that, and I think it's 1057 01:03:35,614 --> 01:03:40,374 because there's so much like falling apart happening, you know, you can't, 1058 01:03:40,654 --> 01:03:44,330 you can't build too much momentum because then the train will, fall 1059 01:03:44,330 --> 01:03:46,530 off the rails or something like that. 1060 01:03:46,600 --> 01:03:50,970 I got to feel like it's, it's something around the way that they designed it 1061 01:03:50,980 --> 01:03:54,190 to like, not be locked into one thing. 1062 01:03:54,860 --> 01:03:59,200 Um, and, and the second you want it to be one thing, it's not that anymore, 1063 01:03:59,250 --> 01:04:05,880 but if you can just like absorb it and appreciate the multitudes of it for 1064 01:04:05,880 --> 01:04:11,577 what it is, It like makes you feel more present, it's like, uh, it's like walking 1065 01:04:11,577 --> 01:04:16,627 around the High Museum with really bright lights on and all the art looks a little 1066 01:04:16,627 --> 01:04:20,007 different in the collection, but like, you really want to be, you're pumped to 1067 01:04:20,007 --> 01:04:26,857 be there, but you have more of a like sustained soul chakra thing than just 1068 01:04:26,857 --> 01:04:33,227 like a lot of energy to do a lot of Red Bull energy to be exercising or whatever. 1069 01:04:33,347 --> 01:04:34,097 I don't know, 1070 01:04:34,122 --> 01:04:36,422 Cliff: Yeah. 1071 01:04:38,162 --> 01:04:42,172 What you did though, I'll ask you to share some more though, 1072 01:04:42,202 --> 01:04:44,412 cause you shared a ton of moments. 1073 01:04:44,412 --> 01:04:48,659 This is a very like, wow, I guess the word would be momentous, but it's not quite 1074 01:04:48,659 --> 01:04:49,069 what I mean. 1075 01:04:49,814 --> 01:04:54,214 Yeah, like you pulled out a ton of just like moments, and those are true for me 1076 01:04:54,214 --> 01:04:56,014 too, but I thought your list was awesome. 1077 01:04:56,334 --> 01:05:01,324 Like how, like what happens when you hit moments that you identify 1078 01:05:01,334 --> 01:05:04,804 as such when you have the context that you just shared about how 1079 01:05:04,814 --> 01:05:06,564 you kind of feel about it overall? 1080 01:05:07,289 --> 01:05:11,429 Kyle: Yeah, I normally think parts don't work in a record when it's 1081 01:05:11,429 --> 01:05:12,759 like part and part and part and part. 1082 01:05:13,289 --> 01:05:18,589 And you know, one of my favorite bands of all time was Every Time I Die, and 1083 01:05:18,589 --> 01:05:22,769 Andy Williams talked one time about how At first they were a band that just 1084 01:05:22,769 --> 01:05:27,819 wrote parts and then they wrote whole songs and then they wrote songs that 1085 01:05:27,819 --> 01:05:29,849 worked together linearly as a record. 1086 01:05:30,449 --> 01:05:33,389 And I I've always seen those building blocks as the way you 1087 01:05:33,389 --> 01:05:36,509 get to being a better and better band because you can just string 1088 01:05:36,509 --> 01:05:38,389 together more time more smartly. 1089 01:05:38,756 --> 01:05:43,576 And maybe there's, Maybe it's less party and more songy than I give it 1090 01:05:43,576 --> 01:05:46,516 credit for, but it seems like the way the dudes in the band talk about it, 1091 01:05:46,926 --> 01:05:50,626 you know, this being only their second full length record that they're trying 1092 01:05:50,626 --> 01:05:54,076 a bunch of stuff and seeing what works. 1093 01:05:54,106 --> 01:05:57,266 And they're trying fragments, you know, fragments add up into 1094 01:05:57,266 --> 01:05:58,626 like a movement or whatever. 1095 01:05:59,206 --> 01:06:04,766 But I think the record, I love the record because it's full of moments that 20 plus 1096 01:06:04,766 --> 01:06:07,276 years on still make me go totally feral. 1097 01:06:07,686 --> 01:06:07,736 Yeah. 1098 01:06:08,021 --> 01:06:09,731 It's underpinned by Dave's vocals. 1099 01:06:09,731 --> 01:06:12,941 I don't think Dave doesn't get enough credit as like one of the 1100 01:06:12,941 --> 01:06:16,881 best vocalists in the history of, of the genre or the approach. 1101 01:06:17,391 --> 01:06:19,611 Everyone's really at the top of their game on this record. 1102 01:06:19,978 --> 01:06:24,028 Great drums, great bass, obviously killer guitar, but Dave's vocals, 1103 01:06:24,028 --> 01:06:27,958 there's the perfect amount of rawness in the capture and like just 1104 01:06:27,958 --> 01:06:29,838 some delicate distortion applied. 1105 01:06:29,838 --> 01:06:34,098 So I think throughout vocals are a cool thing to focus on and isolate. 1106 01:06:34,098 --> 01:06:35,108 And then here. 1107 01:06:35,453 --> 01:06:39,113 how much of the vocal and lyrical styling is clearly influential 1108 01:06:39,113 --> 01:06:40,673 on stuff that came after it. 1109 01:06:41,233 --> 01:06:45,043 But starting in the first song it's got a move that you and I have always loved to 1110 01:06:45,043 --> 01:06:46,543 the point of joking and laughing about. 1111 01:06:46,553 --> 01:06:50,093 There's a cymbal ping, just a boom, and then they go into the last rip. 1112 01:06:50,093 --> 01:06:54,943 Yeah the ting you and I and our buddy Stuart Roan used to comment on 1113 01:06:54,963 --> 01:06:59,363 the ting and how we would, we would look out for that move in bands. 1114 01:06:59,923 --> 01:07:02,053 And that was like, that was a signal. 1115 01:07:02,103 --> 01:07:05,973 That was a That was a conch shell to lose your shit in the pit, 1116 01:07:06,323 --> 01:07:07,653 just like a real quick move. 1117 01:07:07,693 --> 01:07:09,223 So I love it when I hear it. 1118 01:07:09,223 --> 01:07:13,693 And I, I didn't realize that this had those in there, but like 1119 01:07:13,693 --> 01:07:15,170 such a signature move, love it. 1120 01:07:15,170 --> 01:07:17,595 Then you go into Mondrian that's got. 1121 01:07:17,870 --> 01:07:19,810 A weird count, but it always hits. 1122 01:07:20,010 --> 01:07:23,880 I think it's the first time also that I really noticed Brian Cook's bass tone. 1123 01:07:23,890 --> 01:07:29,440 He does a really like gnarly, nasty, gritty but cool, 1124 01:07:29,480 --> 01:07:32,070 tuneful, melodic bass tone. 1125 01:07:32,610 --> 01:07:37,950 And then you get to about a minute 15 and they do that big atonal chord 1126 01:07:37,970 --> 01:07:42,810 in a groove that again has been ripped off a million times since. 1127 01:07:43,430 --> 01:07:45,090 And then about a minute later. 1128 01:07:45,630 --> 01:07:48,680 They go into a groove, a sort of Latin groove. 1129 01:07:48,680 --> 01:07:49,800 And I think the demo. 1130 01:07:50,475 --> 01:07:54,935 For this one was called Latin song, or one of the demos was called Latin song. 1131 01:07:54,935 --> 01:07:57,905 I want to say it was this one, but there is a groove. 1132 01:07:57,905 --> 01:07:58,425 That's great. 1133 01:07:58,425 --> 01:08:02,395 If, if you are on Tik TOK and you love the way people are doing like Bachata 1134 01:08:02,395 --> 01:08:07,225 dances to knock loose suffocate there's a little cool rhythm stuff happening there. 1135 01:08:08,385 --> 01:08:10,595 We've talked about transitions at length. 1136 01:08:11,015 --> 01:08:15,115 You can obviously see where the guitar here evolved into minus the bear and 1137 01:08:15,115 --> 01:08:19,435 shout out to our boy, John Asante, who's a long time, minus the bear fan. 1138 01:08:19,775 --> 01:08:20,745 And he and I, I like. 1139 01:08:21,140 --> 01:08:24,750 parallel pathed our way in college into being like, Oh, we both 1140 01:08:24,750 --> 01:08:29,970 love Dave Knudsen's guitar in really, really separate contexts. 1141 01:08:30,350 --> 01:08:33,040 He got, he got me into Minus the Bear because he was like the 1142 01:08:33,040 --> 01:08:34,810 guy from Botches in this band. 1143 01:08:35,470 --> 01:08:37,620 Initially I was like, I don't know what this goofy shit is. 1144 01:08:38,391 --> 01:08:41,781 but I really, really loved them and they became a band that I, I love a lot. 1145 01:08:42,281 --> 01:08:44,831 So there's some really cool mathy tappy parts. 1146 01:08:45,201 --> 01:08:52,031 And then he does a crazy like robot death rattle solo with some sick pedal work at 1147 01:08:52,111 --> 01:08:56,538 at about five minutes into the song, then, uh, channel channel sort of interlude 1148 01:08:56,548 --> 01:09:00,018 thing shows how good they are with space. 1149 01:09:00,038 --> 01:09:02,068 We talked about dynamics earlier in the episode. 1150 01:09:02,118 --> 01:09:04,968 They like oscillate through dynamics really naturally. 1151 01:09:05,538 --> 01:09:08,738 And then if I, if I recall correctly, there's some like recorded. 1152 01:09:09,033 --> 01:09:14,153 Audio like an audio segment or fragment that they work in which became sort of a 1153 01:09:14,163 --> 01:09:20,361 staple or a cliche in the genre c thomas howell we talked about the what they call 1154 01:09:20,361 --> 01:09:24,971 the ending the the big huge chord part which is actually like two thirds of the 1155 01:09:24,971 --> 01:09:29,951 song starting at about a minute and a half it's the ascending bass notes and 1156 01:09:29,951 --> 01:09:35,876 the guitar taps with delay that goes into Sort of big triumphant part and everyone 1157 01:09:35,876 --> 01:09:39,016 in the band was quick to be like, yeah, Brian came up with that chord progression. 1158 01:09:39,026 --> 01:09:40,296 He's great at writing those things. 1159 01:09:40,306 --> 01:09:45,156 So like the fact that that song is so resonant with their fans, partly 1160 01:09:45,156 --> 01:09:48,706 because it's a, it's a fuck you song to other bands in the scene. 1161 01:09:48,706 --> 01:09:52,516 And partly because it's just like, kind of got a cool triumphant energy. 1162 01:09:52,526 --> 01:09:54,056 A lot of that comes from Brian cook. 1163 01:09:54,423 --> 01:09:58,753 Then a little later on, or I guess right after C Thomas Howell is St. 1164 01:09:58,753 --> 01:09:59,983 Matthew returns. 1165 01:10:00,123 --> 01:10:03,773 I, I called this the Limp Bizkit clunk splat note, which 1166 01:10:03,773 --> 01:10:05,193 I know is just a helmet thing. 1167 01:10:05,193 --> 01:10:10,683 It's just a, like everybody flattens out into a really dissonant low end thing. 1168 01:10:10,683 --> 01:10:13,823 But when they all hit it to your point, the downbeat thing, I think St. 1169 01:10:13,823 --> 01:10:18,533 Matthew is where you can really hear the downbeat because it sounds like Wile E. 1170 01:10:18,533 --> 01:10:21,453 Coyote splatting onto the pavement from great heights. 1171 01:10:21,943 --> 01:10:24,983 I, that's like my favorite aspect of that song. 1172 01:10:25,043 --> 01:10:29,313 And then I was like, is there a guest vocalist on this punk style? 1173 01:10:29,313 --> 01:10:30,793 But it's just Brian cook. 1174 01:10:31,363 --> 01:10:33,143 It's so different than Dave. 1175 01:10:33,588 --> 01:10:35,218 That I was like, this somebody from another band. 1176 01:10:35,398 --> 01:10:37,865 I don't, you know, maybe they got, um, maybe they got somebody 1177 01:10:37,865 --> 01:10:40,325 from a, from a band that they like, but it's just Brian Cook. 1178 01:10:40,895 --> 01:10:42,625 Not just, but it's not Dave. 1179 01:10:43,365 --> 01:10:47,325 And then in, uh, in frequency ass bandit the super ripped 1180 01:10:47,325 --> 01:10:49,535 off move, is it three minutes? 1181 01:10:49,555 --> 01:10:53,795 The, the panic chords, the meh, meh, meh, meh, going into then 1182 01:10:53,805 --> 01:10:56,385 like a super fast chug part with. 1183 01:10:57,065 --> 01:11:00,805 Like repeated lyrics that make you want to jump up on somebody's shoulders and scream 1184 01:11:00,805 --> 01:11:05,805 it directly into the mic like it That is it's like the part of all parts in this 1185 01:11:05,805 --> 01:11:10,335 like smart hardcore music and the lyrics are Who holds my fate in their hands? 1186 01:11:10,645 --> 01:11:15,845 Not you after the refrain of who holds my fate all the lyrics, all the breakdown 1187 01:11:15,845 --> 01:11:18,025 lyrics that I've ever loved in hardcore. 1188 01:11:18,575 --> 01:11:21,645 Um, and I know this is cause we grew up in the South around like the 1189 01:11:21,665 --> 01:11:23,605 pseudo Christian bands and whatever. 1190 01:11:23,965 --> 01:11:28,235 They have a little bit of a like biblical apocalyptic thing to them. 1191 01:11:28,255 --> 01:11:30,595 You know, there's a little bit of a literary reference. 1192 01:11:31,045 --> 01:11:32,495 It's a little bit biblical. 1193 01:11:32,855 --> 01:11:37,093 It's a little bit probably more cerebral than like a throwdown 1194 01:11:37,093 --> 01:11:39,293 or hate breed type thing. 1195 01:11:39,873 --> 01:11:41,623 And frequency is an example. 1196 01:11:42,033 --> 01:11:46,683 That I, I look too often in terms of like a, a good smart, but not 1197 01:11:46,693 --> 01:11:49,583 too smart for no reason refrain. 1198 01:11:49,993 --> 01:11:52,823 And then you go into man, the ramparts and there's the refrain of 1199 01:11:52,823 --> 01:11:57,803 we are the Romans and just the huge big chord that starts and repeats 1200 01:11:57,803 --> 01:11:59,533 throughout man, the ramparts is. 1201 01:12:00,158 --> 01:12:00,628 is sick. 1202 01:12:00,628 --> 01:12:03,758 It's a great, huge, I love a huge album closer. 1203 01:12:04,268 --> 01:12:06,448 I love it when bands go out on their biggest note. 1204 01:12:06,518 --> 01:12:08,138 And they certainly do here. 1205 01:12:09,573 --> 01:12:13,023 Cliff: Yeah, breaking out chants was a cool move. 1206 01:12:13,251 --> 01:12:17,481 Which will surprise you if you listen to this whole thing, 1207 01:12:17,481 --> 01:12:18,431 especially straight through. 1208 01:12:18,826 --> 01:12:20,466 Kyle: Mm hmm. 1209 01:12:20,761 --> 01:12:25,531 Cliff: and I bet I bet if I had to challenge you you could do another 10 1210 01:12:25,541 --> 01:12:29,411 moments that you pulled out of nowhere with another singular listen through the 1211 01:12:29,411 --> 01:12:33,821 record because these are the types of just like you can just time stamp stuff. 1212 01:12:33,821 --> 01:12:35,271 That's like well, that was fucking cool. 1213 01:12:35,501 --> 01:12:36,631 That was crazy All right. 1214 01:12:36,661 --> 01:12:37,751 That was shit. 1215 01:12:37,951 --> 01:12:40,231 That one got me go back do it again. 1216 01:12:40,291 --> 01:12:43,231 Okay, I got that now I'm gonna be ready for that one next time it comes around 1217 01:12:43,446 --> 01:12:46,436 Kyle: I think when you listen for parts, you understand why 1218 01:12:46,436 --> 01:12:48,516 so many bands rip this band off. 1219 01:12:49,086 --> 01:12:53,866 Because if you just isolate it to an atom, you're like, I think I can do that. 1220 01:12:53,896 --> 01:12:58,856 But what made Botch great is they put together 45 minutes of them straight. 1221 01:12:59,456 --> 01:13:03,636 and they work much better in the context of each other than isolated 1222 01:13:04,026 --> 01:13:07,746 and other bands tried to take them and like make them their thing but it's 1223 01:13:07,756 --> 01:13:12,496 it's just 45 minutes of pretty singular moments that they mash together in 1224 01:13:12,496 --> 01:13:17,796 really dynamic ways it's a it's just a like a shit ton of one and one make 1225 01:13:17,806 --> 01:13:22,823 three just for a long time over and over very very alchemic in that way 1226 01:13:23,403 --> 01:13:23,653 Cliff: Yep. 1227 01:13:24,020 --> 01:13:26,960 So we've talked about this a ton, but I think it would be helpful to 1228 01:13:26,960 --> 01:13:31,290 do, we've done this once or twice in past episodes, we want to kind 1229 01:13:31,290 --> 01:13:36,947 of talk about the constellation of things that this created as a result 1230 01:13:36,977 --> 01:13:39,667 of existing at the time that it did. 1231 01:13:40,277 --> 01:13:46,714 And We've mentioned a ton of these, but this is a good, like, let us be your 1232 01:13:47,024 --> 01:13:52,544 related artists in your streaming app thing, because they suck and we're good. 1233 01:13:53,034 --> 01:13:57,164 So, one, one avenue that we've talked about a number of times, right? 1234 01:13:57,254 --> 01:13:59,804 If something in this connects with you, welcome. 1235 01:14:00,469 --> 01:14:00,859 Welcome. 1236 01:14:01,087 --> 01:14:03,777 You, you are a person like us, and we welcome you. 1237 01:14:04,157 --> 01:14:06,197 We don't know what that means either, but we welcome you. 1238 01:14:06,707 --> 01:14:11,827 And, you, especially if you're new to this journey, there is, I have good news 1239 01:14:11,827 --> 01:14:13,557 for you, you will never run out of music. 1240 01:14:13,957 --> 01:14:21,617 So, not only other Botch stuff, yes, but also, Isis, Coalesce, Converge, 1241 01:14:21,867 --> 01:14:24,277 Dillinger Escape Plan, the Blood Brothers. 1242 01:14:24,577 --> 01:14:28,457 Okay, all bands who Like, we're not even talking yet about 1243 01:14:28,457 --> 01:14:29,817 bands who were inspired by them. 1244 01:14:29,817 --> 01:14:33,087 We're just talking about bands that existed at the same time as them, and 1245 01:14:33,087 --> 01:14:36,817 were connected to a similar zeitgeist, uh, and went in different directions. 1246 01:14:37,157 --> 01:14:40,597 And, you know, we mentioned we mentioned a few episodes we've done. 1247 01:14:40,597 --> 01:14:43,517 We also did a Converge episode in the past, so, we'd encourage 1248 01:14:43,517 --> 01:14:44,337 you to check that one out. 1249 01:14:44,347 --> 01:14:45,547 We love Converge. 1250 01:14:45,587 --> 01:14:46,612 Both of us just love it. 1251 01:14:46,902 --> 01:14:51,862 Undyingly but all those are bands that were sort of doing really similar 1252 01:14:52,212 --> 01:14:54,962 when I say similar, I mean similarly 1253 01:14:55,712 --> 01:14:56,562 Kyle: ethos 1254 01:14:56,892 --> 01:15:04,372 Cliff: Yeah Yes, similar ethos and similarly abstracting from similar ideas 1255 01:15:04,652 --> 01:15:08,752 so I don't mean to say that all these bands will sound the same but they all 1256 01:15:08,907 --> 01:15:11,237 Kyle: They, they don't even a little, yeah. 1257 01:15:11,237 --> 01:15:11,887 Mm 1258 01:15:11,900 --> 01:15:16,710 Cliff: but they take off in interesting directions from a singular point and 1259 01:15:16,720 --> 01:15:20,030 you can start to pick out which, which, which parts, you know, you really dig. 1260 01:15:20,260 --> 01:15:24,150 Just a pure example, like even from the bands that we just mentioned, right? 1261 01:15:24,150 --> 01:15:28,570 Like, Coalesce is an inherently, to me at least, like vocal fronted band. 1262 01:15:28,730 --> 01:15:34,735 If you really, really like the sound of vocals in hardcore, you get A lot of what 1263 01:15:34,735 --> 01:15:39,925 you get in Botched, but with a frontman who was scary and large and approached 1264 01:15:39,935 --> 01:15:42,425 the whole thing really differently, right? 1265 01:15:42,715 --> 01:15:48,105 Whereas, like, Converge, as we talked about killer frontman there, obviously, 1266 01:15:48,105 --> 01:15:49,995 but the approach is very different. 1267 01:15:50,215 --> 01:15:55,515 They are making singular noise it is intentionally Not complex, 1268 01:15:55,515 --> 01:15:59,315 but intentionally, I mean composed they are very smart. 1269 01:15:59,515 --> 01:16:03,725 They're doing a lot of things on purpose um, whereas on the other hand like, you 1270 01:16:03,725 --> 01:16:07,795 know, we mentioned the blood brothers like that's that's going to be in the 1271 01:16:07,805 --> 01:16:12,905 we are endlessly antagonistic Direction of things right like I like the blood 1272 01:16:12,905 --> 01:16:17,025 brothers, but it's not the same type of experience you get listening to 1273 01:16:17,025 --> 01:16:22,221 this record so They're just like, and I mentioned earlier, Candiria 2 was 1274 01:16:22,221 --> 01:16:24,841 another band that was around during this time doing really similar stuff. 1275 01:16:25,541 --> 01:16:30,661 And that was the sort of, for me, that was the handful of bands that I discovered 1276 01:16:30,671 --> 01:16:33,931 all at one time and went, Well, fuck. 1277 01:16:34,513 --> 01:16:37,533 I like all of this now, and this is who I am. 1278 01:16:39,463 --> 01:16:44,903 Related to that, then, are bands that resulted from these people 1279 01:16:44,913 --> 01:16:46,123 being in Botched to begin with. 1280 01:16:46,490 --> 01:16:50,150 So, these arms are snakes, minus the bear, which you mentioned. 1281 01:16:50,510 --> 01:16:52,430 Russian circles, sumac. 1282 01:16:53,130 --> 01:16:56,200 Again, all very different bands, actually. 1283 01:16:56,520 --> 01:16:58,390 Especially in that group, that's really fascinating. 1284 01:16:58,390 --> 01:16:59,240 Minus the bear is the 1285 01:16:59,240 --> 01:16:59,990 standout from 1286 01:17:00,090 --> 01:17:03,377 Kyle: And, then do the bands that those guys were in. 1287 01:17:03,507 --> 01:17:05,137 So like these arms are snakes. 1288 01:17:05,137 --> 01:17:06,917 I still think is one of the coolest. 1289 01:17:07,627 --> 01:17:10,857 There's no band that ever sounded like these arms are snakes. 1290 01:17:10,957 --> 01:17:15,956 I think they're really, really rad in the way that like latter day poison. 1291 01:17:15,956 --> 01:17:20,346 The well was just like, oh my God, they were breaking out into something. 1292 01:17:20,346 --> 01:17:20,416 Yeah. 1293 01:17:20,776 --> 01:17:22,606 That nobody else was doing. 1294 01:17:23,076 --> 01:17:24,476 They were really thrilling to me and I'm sad. 1295 01:17:24,476 --> 01:17:25,566 I never got to see him live. 1296 01:17:25,976 --> 01:17:28,916 Um, sumac though, in particular, I'm thinking like 1297 01:17:28,946 --> 01:17:30,636 Aaron Turner is in that band. 1298 01:17:31,116 --> 01:17:32,736 So obviously that's cool. 1299 01:17:33,016 --> 01:17:39,646 But Nick what's his face from Baptist is the drummer and Nick is like one 1300 01:17:39,646 --> 01:17:43,256 of the Dave Grohl posted a Baptist live video because he was like, 1301 01:17:43,256 --> 01:17:45,616 this is one of the best fucking drummers I've ever seen in my life. 1302 01:17:46,046 --> 01:17:46,616 And. 1303 01:17:46,921 --> 01:17:51,531 For the few on the proud who knew and saw Baptist, they were like, Oh my God, 1304 01:17:51,531 --> 01:17:52,991 they were different and they were good. 1305 01:17:53,071 --> 01:17:55,841 And they, and then they get over into the converge side of things because 1306 01:17:55,841 --> 01:17:58,361 they were a God city recorded band. 1307 01:17:58,371 --> 01:18:04,351 So like between Hydra head and death wish God city converge, you know, but 1308 01:18:04,371 --> 01:18:09,141 between the Botch guys on the West coast and the converge guys on the East all 1309 01:18:09,141 --> 01:18:14,561 the good heavy stuff ever of the past 25 years has a root on this tree somewhere. 1310 01:18:15,041 --> 01:18:19,501 The other part of that being Matt Bayless, who, engineered this record, 1311 01:18:19,821 --> 01:18:24,091 was briefly in Minus the Bear, produced a lot of other stuff, like 1312 01:18:24,321 --> 01:18:25,511 you, you mentioned him earlier. 1313 01:18:25,901 --> 01:18:31,151 Uh, the big ones for me, though, are those seminal first three Mastodon records 1314 01:18:31,621 --> 01:18:36,441 Remission, Leviathan, and Blood Mountain that like, if you were coming of age and 1315 01:18:36,441 --> 01:18:39,451 having music in the early and mid 2000s. 1316 01:18:40,056 --> 01:18:45,786 Those are still like, titanic, smart, oh my god, heavy music is breaking 1317 01:18:45,786 --> 01:18:48,396 into exciting new places type music. 1318 01:18:49,036 --> 01:18:50,936 Um, and he was at the helm of the truckers as well. 1319 01:18:51,666 --> 01:18:52,086 I sent 1320 01:18:52,296 --> 01:18:53,936 Cliff: wear my Blood Mountain shirt anywhere. 1321 01:18:55,716 --> 01:18:56,776 Kyle: It's hard in Atlanta. 1322 01:18:56,836 --> 01:18:57,186 There, 1323 01:18:57,496 --> 01:19:01,536 I mean, we could do We've never covered Macedon on this because we would have 1324 01:19:01,536 --> 01:19:05,116 to talk about it for a minimum of six hours just being from Atlanta. 1325 01:19:05,606 --> 01:19:10,026 But I sent you Matt Bayless's, he has like a word document saved on his. 1326 01:19:10,276 --> 01:19:14,536 com on his own website of all the stuff that he's produced or engineered. 1327 01:19:14,866 --> 01:19:17,406 And it's like a two column thing. 1328 01:19:17,846 --> 01:19:20,686 That's one, two, three full pages. 1329 01:19:21,176 --> 01:19:24,046 It's an insane amount of stuff like burnt by the sun. 1330 01:19:24,056 --> 01:19:25,806 He also worked with Brendan O'Brien. 1331 01:19:25,816 --> 01:19:27,936 That's where he cut his teeth after Nashville. 1332 01:19:28,306 --> 01:19:31,696 He was an assistant on Around the Fur, The Deaf Tones. 1333 01:19:31,936 --> 01:19:38,606 He's, uh, seen it all, done it all so there's, there's a lot just to go, if you 1334 01:19:38,606 --> 01:19:42,653 go down the Matt Bayliss rabbit hole by itself that's enough for quite a while, 1335 01:19:43,020 --> 01:19:46,710 Cliff: It would be cool to be cool enough to have a rabbit hole about me. 1336 01:19:47,210 --> 01:19:48,410 That sounds neat. 1337 01:19:48,520 --> 01:19:53,340 So we thank you for your work, Matt Bales, and everyone else who has rabbit holes 1338 01:19:53,340 --> 01:19:55,850 that we get to go down in podcast form. 1339 01:19:56,217 --> 01:20:01,197 Similarly, I mean that, first of all, just the two directions we just gave 1340 01:20:01,197 --> 01:20:05,072 you will, you know, Take you the rest of your life anyway, but other ones to add 1341 01:20:05,072 --> 01:20:10,092 into the mix um, we mentioned earlier like melvins were effectively a A bit 1342 01:20:10,092 --> 01:20:15,142 of a forebearer forebearer godfathers of the scene type deal but close enough to 1343 01:20:15,142 --> 01:20:19,012 kind of be considered peers I think on top of the other bands we talked about 1344 01:20:19,372 --> 01:20:25,942 both melvins and harvey milk and those two bands's Influence and impact in a 1345 01:20:25,942 --> 01:20:28,992 similar time frame in a similar moment 1346 01:20:29,022 --> 01:20:31,232 Kyle: and desire to antagonize 1347 01:20:31,292 --> 01:20:32,742 actively, yeah. 1348 01:20:33,534 --> 01:20:39,504 Yeah, I, I would add on, you know, more modern descendants of that same, uh, 1349 01:20:39,614 --> 01:20:45,764 trolling, shitty, toxic dude life would be like Viagra Boys, who are one of my 1350 01:20:45,764 --> 01:20:50,204 favorite bands of the moment, and Kalisdao Boys, who are one of yours, who take 1351 01:20:50,204 --> 01:20:55,824 very different tacks on the I, I want to put a finger in the eye of all of the 1352 01:20:55,824 --> 01:21:01,994 worst things of this scene, who, that is supposed to be inclusive and an oasis from 1353 01:21:02,044 --> 01:21:03,574 all the bullshit of the rest of the world. 1354 01:21:04,164 --> 01:21:07,114 There's not enough of that kind of stuff because it's very hard to do 1355 01:21:07,114 --> 01:21:11,384 well and smartly and not be like a hack, um, but those are a handful of 1356 01:21:11,384 --> 01:21:16,314 bands that are exceptional because they, they toe a line very delicately 1357 01:21:16,364 --> 01:21:21,904 and humorously and the music is like inarguably great in my opinion. 1358 01:21:22,271 --> 01:21:25,571 Cliff: Yep we'll, plus one, callous dowboys for anyone who 1359 01:21:25,571 --> 01:21:27,111 hasn't taken our word for it yet. 1360 01:21:27,516 --> 01:21:28,256 Kyle: Go to a show. 1361 01:21:28,286 --> 01:21:30,176 The records probably won't make sense. 1362 01:21:30,176 --> 01:21:30,916 Go to a show. 1363 01:21:30,976 --> 01:21:31,906 Go see them at a show. 1364 01:21:31,916 --> 01:21:32,206 It's 1365 01:21:32,221 --> 01:21:32,621 Cliff: Yeah. 1366 01:21:33,728 --> 01:21:37,278 Kyle: I haven't like scratched my head at a thing in a while, but 1367 01:21:37,278 --> 01:21:38,628 I walked out of there last set. 1368 01:21:38,628 --> 01:21:42,088 Like I'm so glad that I'm not going to go put that on in the 1369 01:21:42,088 --> 01:21:43,728 car right now, right this second. 1370 01:21:44,348 --> 01:21:46,118 But that was one of the coolest things I've seen in a while. 1371 01:21:46,485 --> 01:21:49,125 Cliff: That makes sense, although I am somebody who puts a song in the car. 1372 01:21:49,975 --> 01:21:50,505 For sure. 1373 01:21:50,865 --> 01:21:54,735 But, to that point, like, I mean, just to connect dots, right? 1374 01:21:54,735 --> 01:21:58,675 Like, we are gonna go see them soon because we're going to see Dillinger at 1375 01:21:58,675 --> 01:22:01,605 their calculating infinity reunion shows. 1376 01:22:01,980 --> 01:22:05,340 And whatever in New York and like so Dillinger put together a killer 1377 01:22:05,340 --> 01:22:08,960 lineup Uh in several shows, but like calloused owl boys will be there and 1378 01:22:08,960 --> 01:22:11,240 it will work perfectly it will fit 1379 01:22:11,715 --> 01:22:14,585 Kyle: Who else is on those car bomb candy. 1380 01:22:14,800 --> 01:22:15,100 Cliff: and car 1381 01:22:15,675 --> 01:22:16,365 Kyle: Yeah. 1382 01:22:16,642 --> 01:22:22,672 Cliff: Very very good vibe collections, uh overall But, to, to several points 1383 01:22:22,672 --> 01:22:27,705 you made, just again using Callis Dalvois as an example, like the, perfectly 1384 01:22:27,755 --> 01:22:34,595 executed tonally merch thing is a thing they do very well, um, and has 1385 01:22:34,775 --> 01:22:42,535 certainly a spiritual connection back to the aforementioned famous bot shirt, 1386 01:22:43,060 --> 01:22:45,370 Kyle: But Botch boy band walked. 1387 01:22:45,370 --> 01:22:48,130 So God smiles on the Calistel boys could fly. 1388 01:22:48,825 --> 01:22:51,085 Cliff: I'm thinking of the Cowless Dowboy shirt that says, Yeah 1389 01:22:51,085 --> 01:22:54,885 man, I'm gay too, with a bunch of Punisher logos running down the arm. 1390 01:22:58,380 --> 01:23:00,310 Kyle: I forgot about that one, yeah. 1391 01:23:00,380 --> 01:23:01,930 God bless the Kyle Stout Boys. 1392 01:23:02,165 --> 01:23:05,755 Cliff: I've never wanted a shirt that I could never wear more 1393 01:23:06,225 --> 01:23:07,655 than I had in that particular 1394 01:23:07,910 --> 01:23:09,930 Kyle: I want to wear that shit to Applebee's, man. 1395 01:23:10,275 --> 01:23:13,195 Cliff: can, you can get away with it, you're two of me, perhaps. 1396 01:23:14,390 --> 01:23:15,790 Kyle: Big, big guy privilege. 1397 01:23:16,325 --> 01:23:16,675 Cliff: Yeah. 1398 01:23:16,840 --> 01:23:22,845 Kyle: Uh, one, one other thing that I, I want to mention is, uh, I'm a huge fan 1399 01:23:22,915 --> 01:23:29,135 of Brian Cook more beyond the context of Botch, and just as like a music figure 1400 01:23:29,725 --> 01:23:35,155 in like an Iggy Pops radio show kind of way, he or like quest love for other 1401 01:23:35,155 --> 01:23:40,625 people, I guess, basically anything he writes about or recommends is like, 1402 01:23:40,745 --> 01:23:42,275 is worth checking out to some degree. 1403 01:23:42,275 --> 01:23:45,145 He talked about Rick Froberg from Drive Like Jehu and Hot 1404 01:23:45,145 --> 01:23:47,065 Snakes when he passed away. 1405 01:23:47,065 --> 01:23:51,415 And like he said, I can't overstate his influence enough, but he's 1406 01:23:51,415 --> 01:23:54,555 also into stuff like Stars of the Lids, Silver Jews, Jackson C. 1407 01:23:54,555 --> 01:23:56,285 Frank, like folkier stuff. 1408 01:23:56,305 --> 01:23:58,455 He has like kind of folk solo side project. 1409 01:23:58,895 --> 01:24:01,285 But he's been a role model of continuing to stretch and 1410 01:24:01,285 --> 01:24:03,855 evolve as like a, an aging punk. 1411 01:24:04,285 --> 01:24:09,735 On a meta level I have appreciated and taken cues from a lot 1412 01:24:10,185 --> 01:24:11,845 over the past 10, 15 years. 1413 01:24:12,255 --> 01:24:15,435 He also writes on Tumblr about his record collection, like literally 1414 01:24:15,435 --> 01:24:18,525 every record that he owns, adding up into the hundreds, which I think 1415 01:24:18,525 --> 01:24:23,845 is a psychotic and very cool and a labor of love that I would absolutely 1416 01:24:23,845 --> 01:24:27,865 have done In a previous dimension, like 20 year old me would have taken 1417 01:24:27,865 --> 01:24:29,525 that on and done about the first 500. 1418 01:24:29,525 --> 01:24:31,685 And then I've been like, this is horrible. 1419 01:24:31,995 --> 01:24:32,735 Why am I doing this? 1420 01:24:33,654 --> 01:24:35,281 And then he's, he's just very eloquent. 1421 01:24:35,291 --> 01:24:40,051 Like he writes for a lot of bands for like reissues and, and stuff. 1422 01:24:40,111 --> 01:24:43,451 And there's a great interview with him on machine music where he, he talks 1423 01:24:43,451 --> 01:24:47,021 about evolving and inspiration and like trying to be timeless instead 1424 01:24:47,021 --> 01:24:48,321 of tapping into the zeitgeist. 1425 01:24:48,651 --> 01:24:52,211 He talks about the band Fugazi and, and how they were a good. 1426 01:24:52,591 --> 01:24:53,701 Template for him. 1427 01:24:54,231 --> 01:24:57,771 He, he said stuff like they set a very high bar as to how 1428 01:24:57,771 --> 01:24:58,951 bands should conduct themselves. 1429 01:24:58,971 --> 01:25:02,541 And I think a part of growing up is realizing that only Fugazi can be Fugazi. 1430 01:25:02,851 --> 01:25:06,121 Only Fugazi had the leverage and the power to do the kind of things they did. 1431 01:25:06,451 --> 01:25:08,881 They don't necessarily need to be rule makers, you know? 1432 01:25:08,881 --> 01:25:11,811 So I think one of the great things, talking about the serious, unserious 1433 01:25:12,411 --> 01:25:17,201 dynamic of Botch, it's like, Never get boxed into your own, like the 1434 01:25:17,201 --> 01:25:19,551 point was to get out of the box. 1435 01:25:19,561 --> 01:25:21,651 So never put yourself in your own box. 1436 01:25:22,111 --> 01:25:25,801 And that was what made Botch, I guess, like hard or harder to 1437 01:25:25,801 --> 01:25:27,961 appreciate widely in their time. 1438 01:25:28,371 --> 01:25:32,611 But it's the best lesson that you can take from the band too, is like constantly be 1439 01:25:32,621 --> 01:25:37,951 out running the box that you inadvertently accidentally put yourselves in. 1440 01:25:38,341 --> 01:25:40,671 Just by, by like time and repetition. 1441 01:25:41,061 --> 01:25:44,111 So that's why I'll always love and respect the band because they, 1442 01:25:44,591 --> 01:25:46,211 they left behind a good template. 1443 01:25:46,271 --> 01:25:49,838 And I mean, like they, they blew themselves up at exactly the moment 1444 01:25:49,838 --> 01:25:51,898 where things started to happen. 1445 01:25:51,938 --> 01:25:55,218 And I'm a big believer in things only being good because they end or 1446 01:25:55,218 --> 01:25:58,718 because you know, they're gonna And like never overstaying your welcome, 1447 01:25:58,748 --> 01:26:02,138 never playing the chorus too many times, never being Metallica and 1448 01:26:02,148 --> 01:26:03,598 being like, well, I like these parts. 1449 01:26:03,598 --> 01:26:05,368 Let's do them for eight minutes. 1450 01:26:05,718 --> 01:26:08,478 Like always under say you're welcome and leave them wanting more. 1451 01:26:08,588 --> 01:26:11,488 And never, never let them guess your next move. 1452 01:26:11,488 --> 01:26:14,178 If they can guess your next move, you've already lost the war a little bit. 1453 01:26:14,545 --> 01:26:19,405 Cliff: This tees me up well for our last section that we make sure to hit on. 1454 01:26:19,875 --> 01:26:21,045 That I really love. 1455 01:26:21,345 --> 01:26:27,825 And that is, if in listening to either of us, or more importantly, listening 1456 01:26:27,825 --> 01:26:32,779 to this record, something happened, something connected with you, what do you 1457 01:26:32,779 --> 01:26:37,689 do outside of what we're encouraging you to do with just the music itself, where 1458 01:26:37,689 --> 01:26:42,159 you can experience it, and learn from it, and hear new things and all that. 1459 01:26:42,229 --> 01:26:46,554 That's music gives you Eternity in itself, so that's always good 1460 01:26:46,554 --> 01:26:51,004 enough, but a lot of times like music compels you towards something else. 1461 01:26:51,434 --> 01:26:56,654 And we, I'm going to channel some energy from, we did a series of 1462 01:26:56,764 --> 01:26:58,544 podcast episodes called Friday Heavy. 1463 01:26:58,784 --> 01:27:02,694 And we spent a lot of time talking about artists in closer to the scene 1464 01:27:03,014 --> 01:27:05,914 and particularly ones who are active releasing records and touring. 1465 01:27:06,284 --> 01:27:11,024 And so when I want to encourage you, and I bet Kyle will agree. 1466 01:27:11,414 --> 01:27:15,994 When, I want to encourage you about what to do when a band exists 1467 01:27:16,204 --> 01:27:20,774 in that moment and you like them and they're doing something good. 1468 01:27:21,224 --> 01:27:26,974 Please go to them and give them your money and support them now. 1469 01:27:27,341 --> 01:27:27,831 Now. 1470 01:27:28,241 --> 01:27:33,721 Not because it's all panicky or terrible, but simply because bands are very, 1471 01:27:33,721 --> 01:27:35,571 very hard things to keep together. 1472 01:27:35,811 --> 01:27:39,801 Even when they're doing monumentally huge things to an art. 1473 01:27:40,230 --> 01:27:45,840 We have to as much as we can capitalize on moments where you are humanly available 1474 01:27:46,040 --> 01:27:50,850 and a band that's really good is coming through your town or somewhere nearby and 1475 01:27:50,850 --> 01:27:57,675 they're going to play a show and like that show matters and adds up into the Big Lego 1476 01:27:57,755 --> 01:28:03,625 piece that comprises their career, and you simply do not know how long a band 1477 01:28:03,625 --> 01:28:08,765 is gonna last, you don't know what will ha I mean, even Power Trip is an example, 1478 01:28:08,765 --> 01:28:14,065 man, like, everyone who got a chance to see, who could've seen Power Trip, before 1479 01:28:14,065 --> 01:28:18,805 Riley Gale died and did it, regrets it, endlessly, every day, and like, that's 1480 01:28:18,805 --> 01:28:21,375 because you could've been a part of something and you could've supported it, 1481 01:28:21,515 --> 01:28:25,410 when all those human beings were there to receive that from you, and like, It 1482 01:28:25,410 --> 01:28:29,110 doesn't have to be super important or deep or spiritual necessarily, but just 1483 01:28:29,110 --> 01:28:33,890 like we're encouraging you when a band is available and they're playing shows 1484 01:28:34,480 --> 01:28:38,170 and you're connecting with it, find a way to be a part of it in that moment 1485 01:28:38,480 --> 01:28:42,060 because you're going to get something out of that, that you're never going 1486 01:28:42,060 --> 01:28:45,670 to be able to go back and get later when you're just listening to it. 1487 01:28:45,985 --> 01:28:46,295 Kyle: Yeah. 1488 01:28:47,220 --> 01:28:51,270 The older you get, the more you appreciate the I, I got to be there. 1489 01:28:51,270 --> 01:28:54,660 Then moments I bore witness or I, I was part of creating it. 1490 01:28:55,050 --> 01:28:59,170 I think the two MA motivators you know, for anyone who's like, I'm pit retired, 1491 01:28:59,170 --> 01:29:00,970 I have a kid, I'm too old, whatever. 1492 01:29:01,390 --> 01:29:06,180 One is the Riley Gale thing I'm so grateful for the times, I gotta see. 1493 01:29:06,410 --> 01:29:07,000 Power trip. 1494 01:29:07,510 --> 01:29:12,070 And like, sometimes that kind of thing is the motivator for like, it's a weeknight. 1495 01:29:12,080 --> 01:29:13,110 I've had a long day of work. 1496 01:29:13,110 --> 01:29:13,830 I'm tired. 1497 01:29:14,300 --> 01:29:18,240 What's going to get me off my ass to make the drive to go see the show. 1498 01:29:18,630 --> 01:29:20,260 It's that well, it could be over tomorrow. 1499 01:29:20,270 --> 01:29:21,460 Like this band could implode. 1500 01:29:21,840 --> 01:29:25,180 Two is in spite of the odds, the scene is really healthy right now. 1501 01:29:25,190 --> 01:29:28,020 We are experiencing a moment in heavy music. 1502 01:29:28,440 --> 01:29:32,700 Um, so like all the openers from Botches reunion are good fodder. 1503 01:29:32,700 --> 01:29:33,360 Like go look. 1504 01:29:33,785 --> 01:29:39,610 Every single one of them up and go check them out, but like scowl gel Zulu Pest 1505 01:29:39,610 --> 01:29:45,345 control like I could name a gazillion who we've either seen sometime this 1506 01:29:45,345 --> 01:29:48,405 year or we will see later this year at Furnace Fest or something else. 1507 01:29:48,855 --> 01:29:50,305 It's an absolutely incredible time. 1508 01:29:50,305 --> 01:29:53,525 Like the Gen Z kids are straight up killing it. 1509 01:29:53,765 --> 01:29:57,505 So if you want to feel like you are part of a moment, this is the time to do it. 1510 01:29:57,565 --> 01:30:01,175 Go to shows, go check stuff out, go to your local watering holes 1511 01:30:01,175 --> 01:30:02,625 and watch bands and support them. 1512 01:30:02,705 --> 01:30:06,885 There, there are a hundred more coming up that are inspired by those bands. 1513 01:30:06,985 --> 01:30:09,155 That like we don't even know about. 1514 01:30:09,765 --> 01:30:13,805 So be part of it, be different than a, a generation or two ago where like you 1515 01:30:13,815 --> 01:30:17,285 have a little more capital now, if you've got a little extra scratch to give them, 1516 01:30:17,285 --> 01:30:21,435 be a, be a supporter, be a godfather or godmother or god person of the scene. 1517 01:30:21,925 --> 01:30:25,155 Be a person who helps, helps the ecosystem flourish. 1518 01:30:25,430 --> 01:30:30,850 Cliff: And related to that, another thing I'm realizing that I, sort of been able to 1519 01:30:30,850 --> 01:30:33,320 reflect on thinking about this music too. 1520 01:30:34,040 --> 01:30:40,027 When I tried to figure out what it is about it that connects with me, 1521 01:30:40,637 --> 01:30:43,907 you end up with thoughts that don't have a lot of words attached to them. 1522 01:30:43,937 --> 01:30:46,927 You can't quite discern the thing they're trying to think through. 1523 01:30:47,417 --> 01:30:53,364 But for me, one thing that this reminds me of, because sort of, if you can imagine 1524 01:30:53,374 --> 01:30:58,561 the music in this record as a bit of like a physical structure, it There's 1525 01:30:58,571 --> 01:31:04,141 more going on inside of it than anyone sort of actively detects in the moment. 1526 01:31:04,821 --> 01:31:08,291 And I mean something more specific than just, It's greater 1527 01:31:08,291 --> 01:31:09,491 than the sum of its parts. 1528 01:31:09,831 --> 01:31:10,921 Not necessarily. 1529 01:31:11,021 --> 01:31:12,431 It's not an equation. 1530 01:31:12,611 --> 01:31:15,411 Like, it's not linear, in that it's more or less. 1531 01:31:15,571 --> 01:31:17,461 It's different every time you listen to it. 1532 01:31:17,761 --> 01:31:20,511 You pick up something different or a different feel, sort of 1533 01:31:20,531 --> 01:31:22,091 every time you interact with it. 1534 01:31:22,491 --> 01:31:27,926 And for me, I often feel like a person who has more going on 1535 01:31:27,946 --> 01:31:32,836 inside than the container on my outside shows to anybody else. 1536 01:31:33,196 --> 01:31:38,356 I, I feel like a person made up of a million polyrhythms and time signatures 1537 01:31:38,716 --> 01:31:41,676 that aren't intentional, but they are me. 1538 01:31:41,806 --> 01:31:44,866 And they're what I'm experiencing, and frankly, I'm just riffing on them. 1539 01:31:45,076 --> 01:31:48,266 I'm just trying to find something interesting and do something a little 1540 01:31:48,266 --> 01:31:52,176 bit different and see if this, like, entertains me or gives me energy in life. 1541 01:31:52,576 --> 01:31:56,866 And like, Something about knowing that this music exists and how people 1542 01:31:56,866 --> 01:32:01,626 connect with it and how they talk about it Motivates me in a really 1543 01:32:01,626 --> 01:32:07,356 strange way to just be more of myself I actually don't have to explain it. 1544 01:32:07,406 --> 01:32:11,806 There doesn't need to be a thesis on the cover and Honestly, just like this 1545 01:32:11,806 --> 01:32:15,926 band just like someone is listening to this album or this episode right 1546 01:32:15,926 --> 01:32:18,096 now going nope And you know what? 1547 01:32:18,146 --> 01:32:23,201 That's fine You don't have to get it, but if you do, there's something 1548 01:32:23,211 --> 01:32:27,178 that unlocks that feels exponential. 1549 01:32:27,518 --> 01:32:33,078 The ability to have more to pay attention to than you have attention to pay is a 1550 01:32:33,078 --> 01:32:37,798 feeling, and it comes up for me a lot, listening to We Are the Romans and the 1551 01:32:37,798 --> 01:32:44,118 other records that this inspired, and like, I hope that if that thought connects 1552 01:32:44,118 --> 01:32:48,528 with somebody that that gives you energy the next time you listen to this record 1553 01:32:48,538 --> 01:32:54,738 and that it reminds you that being weird and playing it by ear as you go 1554 01:32:54,738 --> 01:32:58,888 along because you trust yourself and you understand that you're making something 1555 01:32:59,198 --> 01:33:02,885 that other people don't have to approve of, get some fucking energy from this man. 1556 01:33:03,135 --> 01:33:08,355 This is a, a perfect encapsulation of what we're capable of as people. 1557 01:33:08,655 --> 01:33:09,155 If we'll just. 1558 01:33:09,544 --> 01:33:12,944 Stop thinking about it so much and stop trying to explain it and go. 1559 01:33:13,404 --> 01:33:16,724 And you've taught me, Kyle, more about that than anyone else, probably. 1560 01:33:17,475 --> 01:33:18,885 Kyle: vice versa, for sure. 1561 01:33:19,405 --> 01:33:25,522 It's important to do that not only for its own sake, but because the world is 1562 01:33:25,522 --> 01:33:28,662 constantly in shitify, the modern world. 1563 01:33:29,022 --> 01:33:33,022 The world at large is battling to, to flatten culture into a commodity 1564 01:33:33,022 --> 01:33:37,202 and to flatten people into data points and things to be transacted. 1565 01:33:37,552 --> 01:33:40,362 Don't let it, if you don't want to do it for yourself, do it 1566 01:33:40,362 --> 01:33:41,992 out of spite against the world. 1567 01:33:42,432 --> 01:33:46,632 Don't let the world flatten you and the people and thoughts and things around you 1568 01:33:46,642 --> 01:33:52,842 that are, that are beautiful and cool and and as of yet, unwritten, like push, push 1569 01:33:52,842 --> 01:33:57,212 back against the world, kick against the pricks and be the boy band of your dreams.